Nila R
Google
A fancy restaurant with fancy prices, yet apparently sugar is the only seasoning in the kitchen—and vegetarianism is treated like a philosophical debate rather than a dietary preference.
Before ordering food, I asked about their special holiday drink and whether it could be made without added sugar. I was told it was “just strawberries” with an added sarcasm that you can’t remove sugar from strawberries. Fair enough—science! I imagined fresh strawberries muddled with soda. What arrived, however, was a glass of fluorescent red sugar syrup vaguely haunted by the memory of a strawberry. I still don’t know whether the restaurant misled the servers or the servers were improvising, but either way, it was impressive.
Moving on to entree, only one salad on the menu was labeled “nearly vegan,” which turned out to be a culinary loophole meaning contains fish sauce. At that point, I wasn’t sure whether to laugh, cry, or applaud the honesty. Eventually, they agreed to make the “nearly vegan” really vegan (Thank you!!!). The Kungpao tofu was tasty, but both the salad and the entrée were aggressively sweet, as if the kitchen’s guiding principle was: When in doubt, add sugar.
Why do restaurants rely on sugar to make food taste good? I thought good chefs coax flavor out of ingredients—through caramelization, balance, and technique—not dump sugar into everything and call it “elevated.” Have they never heard of naturally sweetening ingredients like tamarind, coconut, lemon, yogurt, onions, cinnamon, tomatoes, etc.,? I walked out nearly $100 poorer, then went for a run to deal with the glucose spike.
Ambience: 4
Service (with a side of sarcasm): –1
“Nearly Vegetarian” (a bold concept): –1
Food (save on dessert!!): -1