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2015-10-01
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I am Korean living in Hong Kong and I enjoy eating and cooking in general. My friends call me "food connoisseur" or simply "foodie" and by this, you can guess how much importance I place on food AND pleasure associated with it. To be frank, I do have fairly high standards for food and extraordinarily vast interest in judging its taste. I admit that I am quite picky and hard to please with food but today's review about their dessert has nothing to do with my personal characteristic. The desser
To be frank, I do have fairly high standards for food and extraordinarily vast interest in judging its taste. I admit that I am quite picky and hard to please with food but today's review about their dessert has nothing to do with my personal characteristic. The dessert was awful.
Today I visited Momojein based on many positive feedbacks from my friends and neighbours. But this dessert I had today at Momojein (HKD85) was really a HUGE miss and not worth the money at all. It made me regret having come to the restaurant as a whole.
On the menu, it was described to come with "shaved ice sherbet". So I somewhat expected plenty of shaved ice sherbet with small pieces of rice cake elegantly springkled all over the ice, taking into account its price of HKD 85. However, it was served in a deep rice bowl with a radius of about 5cm. You can imagine how small the bowl is if you look at the above pictures closely- compare the size of it with the aqua panna water bottle and dessert plates next to it.
The amount was not only tiny but the ice sherbet was "literally" a spoonful. (beware my picture looks quite distorted- sherbet was really less than a mouthful, hence my hubby and I could not share it.)
What shocked me was not only the amount of ice sherbet but also the filling underneath. It was small rice cakes deep fried in oil and covered with black sesame powder: nothing more than that.
Having an ample experience of cooking Korean food as a housewife, I can assure you that this dish costs less than 5-10 HK dollars. Let me imagine how they made it. Just 4 pieces of rice cake cut into half making it 8 pieces in total. Then briefly fried in oil. Dipped in honey and rolled in the bed of black sesame powder.
In short, this dessert is something anyone can easily make; especially if you are Korean, you cannot help laughing at its size and level of taste. From my perspective it takes 2 minutes to make and requires not much effort.
Above all it does not deserve to be the most expensive dish (before tax HKD85, after tax HKD94) in the dessert menu. Other dessert menus priced at HKD 65 looked a lot fancier. Do never ever order this dish. You will be thankful to me for pretelling you this.
Even if you don't have sensitive taste buds, most Koreans living in Hong Kong would appreciate that this dessert is a rip off. Moreover it was NOT delicious. I ate 1 piece of rice cake and put my fork down. It was edible but there was nothing special about it. The whole presentation, taste and amount plus price put me off. My hubby tried one or maybe two pieces of rice cakes and we asked for the bill leavinge most of the dessert.
FYI I regularly consume Joel Robuchon/ Mandarin Oriental cakes and this dessert was equivalent to two pieces of such marvellous cakes in terms of price.
At such thought, I was upset. So I complained to the manager about the dessert. She shortly replied she would take my feedback into account but that was it. Normally in a restaurant, they would feel regreful to see their food unconsumed and to hear such complaints. It is quite natural they offer its cancellation or a substitute (another dessert they can confidently present?) or some sorts of good gesture to ameliorate the situation.
However her service was stiff and unkind. We didn't want to be those who expect a free dessert, so paid the bill at the same time as complaining to the manager.
But I cannot erase this lingering impression of the Korean manager in a black suit. In fact, upon entering the restaurant, she showed us our table and I noticed that she was not a kind person, which gave me a bad impression about the restaurant from the beginning. My perception was not wrong. In Korea, we see people's impressions and prejudge them by the images they ooze. The manager did not have a sense of ownership, and she was unkind.
To sum it up, I strongly advise you not to order this specific dessert. Other savoury dishes we had were pretty fine. We had 4 dishes plus steamed rice. The bill came up to 545HKD. Without the horrible dessert, it would have been only 450HKD for two persons. I would give 7.5 out of 10 on average for Momojein's interior, atmosphere ans food. Service was not terrible but I have been so many other restaurants with better service. Last but not least, Tofu balls with kimchee was my only favourite.
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