I have been coming to this place regularly for lunch with my colleagues in the past year or so until they temporarily closed for renovation in July. The cafe reopened in August. Instead of a full service restaurant as it used to be, it's now more of a self service cafe. This reflects in its pricing which is much more reasonable and in line with other eateries in the Kwun Tong area than before. The new lunch menu is a selection of pasta/risotto/salad/sandwich. They all come in sets which include soup or salad, a drink plus dessert. All items are served on a tray. You place your order at the counter and they will give you a pager. When your food is ready your pager will flash and you can pick up your tray at the counter. Expect an average wait of 10 minutes for your food to be prepared. The customers seemed to like or not mind this new format as the cafe was almost full when my colleague and I got there around 1:15 p.m..
For us, the most important thing is the taste of the food. We suspect they have a new team in the kitchen as all the items on the menu are new as well. We ordered two sets - one pan fried sole with lemon sauce ($78) and the other a scallop linguine with mentaiko cream sauce ($88). They were both very well cooked and tasty. My linguine set came with a piping hot and flavourful minestrone soup full of diced vegetables and my colleague chose the side salad instead of the soup to go with her sole set. The salad was simple and the salad leaves were fresh. The sets also came with a small Macau sawdust pudding. We were told the soup and dessert selections change every day or two.
We are pleased to see the food quality has not dropped but the price has. It's just good value for money. We also like the cafe's new self service format. It's less formal and more welcoming.
Pan fried sole with lemon custard sauce
