Thanks to Ricky Chong from Food Morning for inviting me to check out The Meeting Point in China Town.
Despite having a good Taiwanese friend, I've never been quite sure what Taiwanese food actually is. The beef dish I had at Rice Queen in Melbourne piqued my interest, so I was keen to check out this busy Taiwanese café nestling behind Paddy's Market.
We started with a jumbo mixed fruit green tea. Serving the teas in a large carafe seems to be a signature of the restaurant. I initially thought it was to share, but they brought us two! The tea was good with some real fruit and not too sweet, which I often find a problem with iced tea.
Both Phil and I had a bento box for lunch. I had the Stewed Pork Ribs Bento while Phil went for the Stewed Chicken Leg Bento Box. I'd previously thought bento boxes were Japanese, but a quick check on wikipedia informs me that they are traditionally Taiwanese too.
The boxes looked great, but were unfortunately a bit of a disappointment. I was expecting the salad to be room temperature, but the rice, chicken and pork were all cold too. Perhaps even worse they were bland as well. The only truly tasty and original item was the thinly shaved pumpkin with a passion fruit dressing. Something I've never eaten before, but would happily have again.
Things picked up with the desserts. The fresh strawberry pudding had an intense strawberry flavour and the pudding was smooth. The Taiwanese traditional shaved ice usually isn't my thing, but I actually enjoyed the taro, pumpkin, green beans, condensed milk and pearls that covered a mound of shaved ice.
Shop R1.01B Hay Street,
(On the outside of Market city, next to the light rail tracks on the Pyrmont side)
Market City Ground Floor,
Sydney
2000
The food here is ok BUT the service is really bad. I bought the voucher for the previous hotpot and whenever I call them on friday for lunch say a week in advance they will tell me fully booked and they start telling me is ok the voucher valid till dec. The thing is i dont want to wait till Dec I want to use the voucher now. So what I did was I make my way down to "meeting place" and I went in and had ordered something to eat and guess what I was there for around 2 hrs and there is only 2 tables occupied and when I called before they tell me fully booked. I wonder if they are trying to give excuses and try to push people towards the expiry so that they do not have to warrant the voucher.. To me they are just not honest. They should be question over this. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteE
Hi E,
ReplyDeleteI didn't have any bad experiences with the service. It wasn't anything special, but what you'd expect from your average China Town joint. However, if I'd bought a voucher and was then limited from using it I'd be pretty annoyed.
Richard,
ReplyDeleteI think is the business ethic.. I think they do it on purpose. You can keep telling people you are fully booked but u are not. Sooner or later people will find out.
I bought the same voucher but I didn't have any problem with the booking. In fact, i think they probably have the best customer service around Chinatown area, they waiter was so helpful and attentive and most importantly can speak English properly unlike some of the Korean or Japanese resturants around Haymarket, they even asked to fill out a customer staisfaction form before we left, i thought the overall experience was great.
ReplyDeleteIn terms of the booking, I think some restaurants restrict the number of bookings on group purchase deals like this, which too certain extent its quite reasonable because obviously they want to keep some tables available for their normal customers.
James,
ReplyDeleteI understand about the group purchase but it cant be fully booked every friday lunch where there were no one there when I went there myself, I actually called right outside the shop and they told me is fully booked. I actually booked for 12.15pm and when I went in there were only 1 table occupied and later another 2 people came in and the rest of the tables are empty. I guess it does not explain the quota for group voucher isnt it? Thanks.
Some restaurants employ restricted seating for group vouchers like the case when I went to District Dining. Although it sounds like this place just got caught out in saying they were fully booked when they clearly weren't :-)
ReplyDeleteSimon,
ReplyDeleteIn fact is not even group, The voucher is for 2 people. If they cant take 2 people is as good as restricting all seats. So why worry putting up their vouchers on sale? I just dont understand. I just find that they (Meeting Place boss)are generally not sincere and try to con the customer.
I didn't expect these dishes are easily available also in China Town Restaurants.I like to eat strawberry pudding with mixed fruit green tea in breakfast.Next time i will try to arrange my next meeting with client at that place.Sydney Conference Center
ReplyDelete