Dinner at this restaurant in the Hotel Lisboa in Macau. This was an interesting meal, with a couple of dishes that I struggled a bit with, but overall I liked it and I think I can see why it is well regarded.

The service was very attentive. We went on a public holiday, so I thought it would be busy, and I booked months in advance - but it was almost empty. This resulted in the main room having us and one other table, but wait staff standing around everywhere with nothing to do most of the time.

Food:

Steamed Whole Fresh Crab Claw with Winter Melon: Love the expert de-shelling, the tender and slightly sweet crab meat and the winter melon having the slightest resistance when biting into it. I'm not sure what the sauce consisted of, but it lent a slight richness to the dish. A definite highlight of the meal and my favourite of the two crab claws.

Deep-fried Whole Fresh Crab Claw with Peppercorn Salt: This was good also, the crab was still tender and the batter is lighter than it appears, letting the crab flavour shine. The peppercorns gave it a nice little punch.

Sautéed Garoupa Fillet with Broccoli: The fish was very moist and had good flavor, the vegetables were similarly well cooked. Relatively simple but a good way to present the fish and show off its quality.

Sautéed Chicken with Onions in Black Bean Sauce in Casserole: I liked this dish, it's probably a bit closer to the Cantonese style I'm used to, but I thought it was well balanced and just generally tasty.

Braised Pomelo Skin with Shrimp Roe: First dish we were presented with was undercooked, the waitress couldn't slice it. A second attempt came not too long after and this was better. This is one of the signature dishes of the restaurant, so I was excited to try it, but to be honest I struggled a bit with it - the shrimp roe was incredibly powerful and the texture was a bit too mushy. It was interesting but I don't think I'd order it again if I went back.

Pan-fried Noodles with Fresh Crabmeat: This dish was fine, but not especially memorable; we probably should have ordered something else.

We had lunch at Robuchon a Galera in the Hotel Lisboa, Macau.

The food was outrageously good and the value for money at lunch is unbeatable. The presence of gold leaf on almost everything was pointless but didn't detract from the meal.

I loved that the wine list comes either as a massive leather bound 300+ page tome or on a somewhat more modern iPad with searchable pdfs for each region.

Loved the numerous trolleys with selections of bread, butter and dessert.

Wine and food service was perfect, couldn't have asked for any more. Overall it totally lived up to its reputation.

Food:

White asparagus panna cotta with tomato coulis - Vibrant and delicate. This was a perfect start.

Tuna belly on heart of romaine with crunchy vegetable medley and “tonnato” sauce - Beautifully presented. Lovely seared tuna belly. The tonnato sauce had a real punch to it.

Crabmeat in tomatoes broth perfume with fresh herbs and waffle toast - An out of this world level of good. Intense, concentrated tomato flavour in the broth, the crabmeat had delightful pockets of roe as a surprise throughout. The shiso leaves on top were interesting with their sweet&spicy notes and gave some extra depth to the dish. The waffle toast was just delicious.

Scallop, squid and shrimp with saffroned fregolas and basil emulsion - Scallop was perfect. The squid was stuffed with chorizo and was wonderfully good. I haven't had fregola before but it was interesting and paired well with the other elements. The basil flavour in the emulsion was very mild thankfully.

Braised “Wagyu” beef cheek pepper aromatic and creamy polenta with parmesan- The beef was incredibly tender and the sauce was nicely rich. The polenta on the side was tasty as well. This dish probably had the least wow factor, but was still very good.

Following our meal at Tin Lung Heen, we had dessert at the Chocolate Library, we were the only patrons there so we had our pick of tables.

Chocolate soufflé with raspberry coulis and chocolate petit fours was the better of the two dishes. This was a classic combination of flavours that was executed well and certainly passed the “deliciousness test”.

Chocolate fondue with marshmallow, brownie, brioche and chocolate pasta was straight forward except for the chocolate pasta which wasn't that good anyway. The other items were fine and it's hard to dislike something dipped in decent quality chocolate.

The service was very mixed. It was obvious that they were trying hard but a number of requests were lost somewhere between the table and the recipient, so we had to ask for various items multiple times, a request to view the wine list was made twice and it failed to appear at all. It just seemed like the level of service they are aiming for wasn't quite in place yet. Hopefully these issues have been sorted out by the time you read this review.

The food on the other hand was top-notch. A sweet turnip appetiser was a perfect first bite. The Deep fried scallops with mango dip combines two of my favourite things, so I was very partial to it to begin with but the scallops were cooked just right and the mango dip gave the dish a lift with some sweetness providing a foil for the (light) deep fried coating. Pan fried lotus root stuffed with fresh crab meat was brilliant and the Crispy roasted pork belly pushed very hard for top spot of this dish among some extremely good competition.

Live crab with salt and chilli, wok fried in soy sauce was another wonderful dish. The quality of the crab shone and the other flavours played perfect support roles. This was an expensive dish but it was worth it.

Chilled shredded chicken with green onion and chilli oil was a good dish, the green onion gave the dish some texture, it just didn't have as much of a kick from the chilli as expected so was a little bit one-dimensional. Deep fried crispy chicken was good as well but wasn't quite up to the standard of Ming Court and Man Wah so suffered in direct comparison.

Overall the lacklustre service was made up for by outstanding food.

This meal was exceptional from start to finish. The setting, service and food were all world class.

Without doubt the service was some of the best I've ever encountered. Professional but charming as well, nothing was too much trouble and everything ran seamlessly.

I'll just write about my dishes here, but of the little I got to taste of the others they were of similarly high quality.

Shellfish Consommé with Ginger Aroma, Lobster Carpaccio and Crispy Palamos Prawn - The consommé was simply presented, but the lobster on the side draws attention with vivid red and green herbs contrasting against the Carpaccio. The intensity of the consommé was wonderful, being played off against the freshness of the Carpaccio and prawn.

French rib-eye beef with gratin dauphinois and wild mushroom pastry in merlot sauce - Excellent quality beef, loved the presentation of a little line of mushrooms along the side of the plate. The mushroom pastry was outrageously good, a rich and creamy sauce with earthy mushrooms and crisp pastry. Not innovative but simply great.

Wild Strawberries with Lavender Blossom, Crispy Almonds and Malaga Sorbet - Beautifully presented - there are only a few different elements visible but the shape and angles are very well thought out, then cracking open the cylinder your eyes are drawn to reveals another set of layers. The flavours matched the presentation, I love wild strawberries and these tiny bites were delicious, along with the other flavours that were complimentary to the main strawberry theme.