Timothy Lee
Google
I went here last week for a tasting menu (150€ pp) and I have a few thoughts about this restaurant, although overall it was a acceptable experience.
For the price point of this tasting menu, I expected there to be some kind of suggested wine pairing but there wasn’t - and considering how large the wine list is, and how busy the sommelier was, unless you know what wines you like, it became overwhelming. It was also hard to get the attention of anyone unless they were coming out with a dish for us, which became a waiting game and a bit annoying at times.
Service:
Everyone we spoke to was very kind and very knowledgeable - in terms of hospitality, this place gets full marks for the atmosphere and experience everyone was trying to maintain, which I appreciated. However, the service of the food was a bit disappointing, again considering the price point of the tasting menu. It felt a bit disorganized - we got the same dish twice by accident, and in one instance the dish toppled over en route to our table (it was a stacked pork belly and dumpling dish) and was quickly brought back to the kitchen to fix before it was given to us again. Again, it felt a bit sloppy even though I didn’t notice the restaurant being particularly busy that evening.
Food:
The food was overall fine - there were some great moments where a fusion of western and eastern flavors came together wonderfully and in very clever ways. The first 3 plates that came out were definitely some of the most interesting and flavorful of the entire tasting menu. I think my favorite plates were the mortadella-stuffed tortellini soup that also gave the warmth of a hot and sour soup, but also the soft mochi filled with a Thai-like red curry. However, each subsequent dish in this 10-course meal was increasingly rich and indulgent without any opportunities for a refresher (something light and acidic ). This made me enjoy the later dishes less and less because it became a bit too decadent. In addition, a lot of the dishes were in some form of a dumpling which felt a bit too easy and boring, as many of the dishes shared a textural similarity and it became a bit uninteresting flavor-wise as well. As for the desserts, the shaved ice was the type of refreshing break I really needed after a series of really heavy bites, but the churros with ginger/chocolate sauce was my least favorite of the entire tasting menu. The ginger and chocolate flavor did not work as well as they hoped - neither was fragrant enough and as a result the overall flavor felt neither here nor there (however, this was also influenced by the fact that I was overwhelmed from having too much successive rich dishes in a row). Again, considering the price point of this tasting menu I would have expected to enjoy more of the dishes offered and the sequence of how they were presented to us, but unfortunately it didn’t quite reach that level of satisfaction for me.
Overall, I’m glad I came to try it, but next time I may just order a la carte and pick the dishes I liked.
The wine and cocktails were fabulous though.