When Bay Area restaurateur You You Xue saw a customer changing her son's diaper atop a communal table in the middle of the dining room, she felt she had to put an end to the madness.
At the time of the incident, about a year ago, Xue had already been thinking that customer behavior at his Chez Xue restaurant in Foster City had deteriorated, with kids “messing around and basically trashing the place” and parents not putting a stop to it, he said.
The San Mateo County restaurant has used a digital menu since opening in 2021 that customers can access with a QR code. That's why it was easy, Xue said, to place a notice at the top of the menu: “Please monitor your children.
“Chez Xue is a family restaurant. However, we are not a playground. Please ensure that children REMAIN SEAT at all times and are respectful of other guests and the dining room environment. Running, shouting, making noise with utensils, etc. WILL NOT BE TOLERATED!” it is read.
It notes that guests who do not respect the policy may be asked to leave and that the restaurant will “hold parents financially responsible for all damages caused by their children to restaurant property.”
The policy has been in place for about a year, Xue said, but it went viral last week and made headlines after another local business owner posted screenshots of the restaurant's policy on X.
To ensure parents know the restaurant means business, the warning also cites “recent damage.”
Examples include an incident in April 2025 during which a child picked up and then broke a credit card machine on the floor, the restaurant said, resulting in a $327.03 bill for parents. In one December incident, according to Chez Xue, a child etched drawings into the table surface with a utensil, costing parents $109.38. A broken teacup that was knocked over by a child playing on a seat resulted in the parent being charged $5.47.
Xue said the restaurant seeks to accommodate families. It's not a fussy place, with bright lighting and no candles, an environment in which young children could, in theory, run around. But he said he feels like “some people take advantage of that.”
“We're a casual restaurant,” Xue said, “but we're not a Chuck E. Cheese.”
Xue, who also owns a cozy Michelin-awarded restaurant called wonderful, serving Hunan-style Chinese food in Millbrae, doesn't shy away from the spotlight. Several years ago, he lashed out at so-called “junk fees” on bills and in 2024 sued dozens of San Francisco companies for hidden surcharges. In another lawsuit, he claimed that an arcade rigged its claw machines against players, claiming it operated as “a children's casino.” That year, he also ran for a seat on the Millbrae City Council, but lost.
Xue squarely blames the parents for the children's behavior, but said he doesn't like playing enforcer. “I don't want to be put in that position,” he said. “It's very uncomfortable to go up to a parent and say something so obvious.”
Rowdy children pose another challenge for restaurants like his that have struggled during the COVID-19 pandemic and, more recently, skyrocketing prices for beef, cooking oil and other products, Xue said. He sees Chez Xue as his own home, he said. That's why politics is taken seriously.
“He's survived against all odds,” he said, “and so I hope people show more respect.”
The overall reaction to the policy has been overwhelmingly positive, Xue said, apart from some comments on social media that charging for a broken teacup was a stingy move. The restaurant has even received some new customers, as well as phone calls expressing their support.
“We said the quiet part out loud,” Xue said. “We said something that a lot of people are thinking, and we came forward and spoke on behalf of other restaurants and on behalf of customers who had a meal ruined by a rowdy child.”
Since Xue instituted the official policy, and particularly since he made the notice more prominent at the top of the menu, the number of incidents “has dropped significantly to basically zero,” he said.
The 28-year-old, whose legal name is Alexander Xue and who has no children of his own, said he had seen some parents become more lax, with a fuss that his own parents would not have tolerated from him growing up.
At the end of the day, however, he is only concerned with what happens within the four walls of his business and recognizes that “the vast majority of parents are very responsible.”
Still, from time to time, some “ruin the experience for everyone else.”
