SML  

Dropped by SML for a few small bites to eat as there is a wide selection.

Meatballs in spicy tomato sauce: taste was ok, probably because of the sauce. Once I cut open the meatball you could see the inside was still very pink, so not fully cooked yet. Then I became disappointed.

Fries with sea salt: these were ok..actually a little better than the average fries you get in restaurants. Of course if you are having some drinks then these would taste even better.

Seabass: it was overcooked a little and a bit on the chewy side, which was disappointing.

The best part of going here is that all the portions are small so you won't feel too guilty of you order something and not eat all of it.

A bistro style restaurant
We ordered a small size sea bass and a small size clams linguini with white wine sauce. As a side dish, we ordered french fries.
The portion listed as small is for 1-2 serving; however, what i got was hardly a portion for 1. The linguini was supposed to have white wine sauce, but at last the only flavor i tasted was just spicy. Portion of the fries were even bigger than the linguini!
Service was as bad as the food. They actually gave us the bill twice.
In conclusion, its a very bad experience.

We were 7 people, I ordered my dish and it took extremely long to arrive and the restaurant wasn't even busy. The waiters made several mistakes such as bringing us the wrong dish and a wrong drink. The food is horrible considering the price and the portion. I ordered a medium sized mushroom risotto and the sauce was much too thick, tasted bland and the portion even though it was medium looked like a starter portion. 3 of us finished our dishes before the other 4 dishes arrived. In conclusion, overpriced considering the quality and unreasonably small portion for a "medium sized" dish, if you must go I suggest don't have anything else but drinks as it is the only thing that is almost guaranteed to have the same quality as in other restaurants

I took the kids here for lunch during the week…it was a later lunch [about 1:00pm] and we had no problem getting a table. The restaurant is set up more European Beer Hall style in which sharing a table is often a common practice. But for most Americans this can be somewhat unusual. As we sat down we saw a promotional display on the table for milkshakes. My son was excited when I agreed that we would all get milkshakes with lunch. Well…the waitress informed us that they only had Strawberry and Mango flavored ice cream; no chocolate or vanilla. Seemed odd…but what can you do[my son was quite disappointed though].

Getting past the milkshake debacle…we ordered our entries. I ordered the classic lasagna al forno [medium]. It was good…not great…but good. The portion [medium] was just about right for me. My daughter ordered the spaghetti carbonara which she thought was very good! My son fell back to his old reliable selection…the burger. The size and flavor was impressive [considering it was advertised as a British Burger…. not really sure what make a burger “British”.

I do like the concept of being able to select either small, medium, or large for you portion but I do miss the extras should as fries or other included sides. Anything like that would be a side at SML.

Would I go back to SML…probably not? Would I recommend it to anyone…maybe, but I think there are better places in Time Square.

We didn't make reservations, but we got seated anyway, but we were told we only had 1.5 hours to eat. The interior and even the toilets were retro-look and well designed and comfortable. We ordered a few different sizes and food types.Lasagna was nice and cheesy, and quite filling, just a bit too small for MediumChicken Pasta was well flavored and yummySpinach salad was excellentFajitas was the best dish, juicy and well flavored.

Overall, the food was delicious, but I believe that the Medium Sized dishes weren't quite large enough compared to the small dishes. Easily the meal should have been around $200 maximum especially since we didn't order drinks, but came out to over $300 so that was disappointing. It's not value-for-money, but it's a very cool concept with tasty food and good service. I would come again, but only if I had a discount or if it was a special occasion.

Seated straight away. Nice environ overall.

Very attentive staff from the off - almost too much so.

Orders taken and drinks came very quickly. Nice water bottles designed in Italy supposedly.

Fries came first. A really good size 'M' portion. Cooked really well and nice and crunchy down to the last one. A good smattering of salt too.

Fajita came next....sizzling when it arrived and tasting pretty good. Not totally authentic but nice nonetheless. Maybe a few too many herb type weeds in it, but the chicken was cooked well and five assorted condiments helped it along. 'L' size but maybe not quite enough to fill someone who was, well, very hungry.

Linguine with clams followedThe clams were huge and very clean looking. The pasta was 'saucy' enough to keep it nice and moist throughout and the only complaint would be that it was a little salty. I would however eat it again. 'M' size and certainly filling. Perfectly cooked pasta.

The burger was last to arrive, but was worth the wait. 'L' size and certainly a good size for someone such as myself. Really enjoyed it and it was cooked very well indeed - slightly pink and the meat was falling apart which is something that I find makes a burger that much more 'authentically homemade'. The only real complaint, and something which i find to be annoying in many places, is the need to put pickles in a burger. It calls itself the 'British Burger' and whilst i have not lived in the UK for a long time, I do remember that finding pickles in a burger is not that common at all. They weren't listed on the menu as being in the burger so, KEEP THEM OUT! Otherwise, a good burger and one which I will be eating again.Overall, one of the better meals we have had out of late and a place that I will definitely be going back to to sample other things on the menu. Also, the option of sizes is a really good idea and it applied to each dish on the menu so theoretically, everyone should be able to find something which suits them and their appetite.

Really nice lunch and definitely a place I recommend for others to try....

Had light lunch with daughter there yesterday.
Nachos quite good with 3 different dips
Buffalo wings are tasty
Grilled lamb chop quite tough and charred
Dessert came in super tiny proportions
Mango pavlova dessert too sweet for my liking
Price range quite exorbitant
Ambience relaxing since the place is big and not too crowded

We arrived at 1920 or so and the place was busy but not packed. We were asked to order our drinks when the menu was presented.

I ordered a L-sized British burger and my mate had a Lasagne and Lamb chop.

Food arrived after 15 minutes or so. My bun for my British burger was barely warm and had a card board feel. My first bite of the beef pattie was more revealing. That burger had been sitting around for at least a good 20 minutes before arrival.

While I could see the beef, I would still ask Where is the Beef? There was no sizzling, no taste of the beef and the veggie and that sliced tomato on top made the overall impression even worse. I am pretty certain my puke would taste warmer than your food.

This was my first "British" burger and would certainly be my last. Maybe that's why it is called British....cold and frosty. Your crew is not good enough even serving for a soup kitchen.

I suggest that you update this dish to call it an Arctic Burger.

BTW, this place became so NOISY then we left to have coffee and dessert elsewhere. Next time i write here, it will be for SML's orbituary. The Press Room Group, please take note!

The most underwhelming and poor value meal I've had in HK for a long time. The food is well presented and a lot of effort is put into the marketing, but no skill into the preparation. Very poor imitations of classic dishes. We had a salty and but somehow flavourless clam pasta, some average lamb kebabs, a passable but unbelievable small morsel of carpaccio and a completely tasteless paella. The portions should be renamed tiny, small and medium and put a small percentage of that marketing energy into making passable food.

My husband and myself decided to visit SML after being undecided about where to have our dinner as we had passed by the restaurant over a few occasions and the place looks inviting. It was a decision gone wrong.

I wanted to order the seared seabass but unfortunately it was not available. The decision to order grilled cod fish (medium) was also a wrong decision. When it finally came, I was apalled by the size of the serving as there were only two pathetic slices of fish, which could have easily been eaten up in 1 minute. When I tasted it, it was not hot, which was a huge minus point. I ended up finishing my cod fish with frustration and disbelief. I was indeed a hefy sum at $102 (not inclusive of service charge) for the two puny slices. If I were to order the small portion, would I be served just one slice? I ended up waiting for my husband to finish his meal. He order the linguine with clams and was disappointed with the quality of the linguine. It tasted like supermarket's quality.

The diner beside us seem to have an equally bad experience. He had ordered a burger and finished it up. However, his salad order did not arrive and he tried to communicate this to the waitress. However, the waitress' command of English understanding was so bad that the diner had to explain and repeat a few times. In the end, he chose to cancel his order, settle his bill and leave promptly. Wise move indeed.

One of the diner at 2 tables across had to have her alocholic drink upsized as I think she was surprised by the size that was served. She had to upgrade it to medium.

The meal was certainly not satisfying and filling and we had to settle for desserts to fill our stomaches after that.
We will never return to SML and I will never recommend anyone to have their meals there.
One bad experience is enough.

This place had so much potential. Having a diverse and impressive spread of menu items and an ability to have yourself customize the size of your dish seemed great... however the food drinks and service were horrible. We first took advantage of the 2 for 1 drinks during Happy Hour. Ordered a mojito and it came out brown, tasting like sprite with some super crushed ice. Terrible. We then asked to change to the Sangria... which was also disappointing. The flavors again were strange with the fizzy sprite taste and they added cucumbers in Sangria. Last time I checked, cucumbers did not prove to be authentic.

On to the food. We ordered Mac n Cheese as well as Lasanga (Big mistake). Both dishes resembled soup. Friends was cheese soup, and mine was tomato soup. The food tasted straight from the frozen section of ghetto italian food (Stouffer's microwaved entrees are better than this) and it lacked texture. We also opted to share some nachos, which were also underwhelming.

I really wanted to like this place, but unfortunately, it has failed me. Will not be back.

因為MANZO 2.30分便不收新客, 所以我們去了next door的SML.

因為不是太餓, 所以我們只叫了一些輕食
1. SALMON WITH MANGO SASA (M) : SALMON 是OVERCOOK了, 所以很乾, 好在有MANGO SASA的SAUCE不然真的很難finish the whole dish. even the portion was super small, only 2 thin slides.
2. Tomato toast (M) : i love the combination of hot toast with cold tomato sauce. once and again the portion is too small even i wasnt that hungry.

Overall, food was good but abit overpriced because of the small portion. I wont condsider to come back to have the next try as nothing really special and the couch was quite uncomfortable.

This story teaches us to browse openrice before entering any restaurants!

I don't know what the others think, but I definitely expect more from a restaurant in times square! it was about six in the evening, and my friend and I (2 people in total) wanted to try something new. This dining concept of S,M and L size is actually quite innovative for me and we were interested. But the menu really pissed us off. Yes it is bilingual, but it is in English and SIMPLIFIED Chinese. I felt really strange because I am in Hong Kong! I don't really like reading simplified Chinese, come on.

But anyway it is the food matters. I don't remember clearly but I did ordered a plate of classic lasagna al forno in small size. I have to say, it is REALLY a small plate as if it is in XS or even XXS. It is like you can finish the whole plate in three seconds. Plus, it is not really delicious, it is just like another ordinary lassagna in other restaurants. I don't expect this kind of quality judging from the price and its location! Some upstairs cafes may even have better quality than this one.

We don't know it is just us or what, and then we decided to browse the openrice app on our iphones and discovered that there are in fact a lot of negative comments towards this restaurant! We just couldn't bear it, so we decided to leave the restaurant. We have to wave for a long time until the waiters saw us. The conclusion is - I won't visit the restaurant anymore.

After dinner, around 10:00pm, we are 4 people to have a drink in SML. At the beginning, this is nothing happen.
Later on, one of my friend took a cushion from the empty seat of next table (at the end nobody sat there), one of the waitness
showed very seriously eye contact to us, she did not say anything, but she walked at least 6 times to our table and
wanted to speak to us but did not say anything at the end. (This is very annoying!)
However, this is not that serious of the service, and the worst came when we were ordering.

The waiter is the one 捆頭髮的, when we are ordering, he already showed the impatient face.
One of my friend asked "what kind of cone is for the medium size of ice-cream?" He did not answer and
kept silent, and then my friend asked again "can I choose two favours since there are two scoops for the medium
size?" and then he replied in absolutely bad tone "絕對絕對無可能,係唔得 !!" We all shocked at this moment!
Not only this, when my other friend ordered "茉莉花茶", he was in bad tone again and said in very rude "What do you mean
茉莉花茶?" and my friend said "Jasmine tea", and he said "You are totally wrong, Jasmine tea is 香片! 茉莉花茶
is camomile tea!" As I know 香片 is another name of 茉莉花茶, so 香片 or 茉莉花茶 can be Jasmine tea, not Camomile tea!
I believe this waiter should have better knowledge about food and drink before going to challange your customers!


The mood of Saturday night was totally ruined as the really BAD BAD SERVICE I have ever seem.
We won't visit this restaurant anymore, totally bad experienced here!

Went there on a Sunday at 9pm for dinner with my husband, and the experience was good.
The decor was simple, warm and stylish.
Waiter was patient and nice, as we wonder how many S/M/L dishes we should order, we asked for recommendation and he recommended us to order 6 or 7 S dishes.
End up we have ordered below 6 S dishes -
Mediterranean fish soup
Anchovy toast
Buffalo wings (4 pieces)
Lamb kebab
Mushroom risotto
Cooked vegetables with sesame

The fish soup comes with a piece of toast and cream (or cream cheese?), it taste a bit like tomato sauce from a sardine can - yet its still tasty especially the toast was great after dipped in cream and soup.

Anchovy toast is okay.

Buffalo wings are quite spicy and good

Lamb kebab is juicy and taste good

Mushroom risotto is nice, there are more mushroom than rice.

Cooked vegetables is refreshing

In general, as expected, portion of food were small, and 6 dishes are enough for both of us - although we dont want to eat too much, so people have bigger appetite may need to order 2 more. I like the experience of eating tapas size Italian dishes so that I can try more even we are ordering for only 2 persons. Food quality and taste are not excellent, but good enough as a simple everyday meal.

The bill was $228 for both of us, a very good price for dinner.

Its a very good value and good place for small group of people who want varieties of food. I will come back again.