I have been waiting to try Hakkasan ever since it opened, and finally got my chance to do so this Restaurant Week, without blowing a hole in my pocket. I was super excited to try a sampling of their menu offerings, and starved myself all day in eager anticipation.
The ambience of Hakkasan can be summed up in one word – it was very BLUE. I was honestly a little jarred by the electric blue lighting, which in an attempt to be trendy, felt a bit like a (very expensive) fishtank. The lounge-y music didn't do much for the dinner experience either, it was too loud and thumping. I’ll grant that service was very professional and just what you’d expect from a schmancy place like this.
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| Electric blue Hakkasan |
Before coming here, I’d read what the menu was going to be and must confess that I was more than slightly disappointed with their selection. Sure, I’m a huge fan of dim sums and fried rice, but I expected a little something more creative from here. Anyway, we decided to give it a go.
The hot and sour vegetable soup I started with was very tasty. A little on the gelatinous side, but felt good on the throat. The sweet corn chicken soup however, tasted just a little tooooo sweet. They'd overdone the corn bit, so it was more like corn soup. It was decent, but nothing special.
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| Vegetarian Hot and Sour Soup, Sweet Corn Chicken Soup |
Our starters consisted of chicken shu mai, chicken xiao xing, and crystal dumplings. Each was served with a cute little bowl of very delicious red chilli oil. The shu mai was good, but no different from what you'd get at Royal China or anywhere else. The caviar it was topped with was overpowered by the taste of the chicken.
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| Chicken Shu Mai with Chilli Oil |
The aptly named almost transparent crystal dumplings were exquisitely prepared. It made for a good light bite, and went well with the chilli oil.
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| Crystal Dumplings |
The xiao xing was the clear winner - crispy on the outside, tender and mildly flavoured on the inside, with a special brown sauce that brought out the flavour very well. This dish was clearly the highlight of the meal for me.
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| Xiao Xing Chicke |
I was frankly disappointed with the main course. Egg fried rice and hakka noodles? It’s hard to innovate with something so standard. Anyway, the fried rice was whatever - I mean, how different can it possibly be? They had used a lot of egg yolk in it, which made it a little yellower, but otherwise, it was no different from anywhere. And the hakka noodles were pretty "meh" too. In fact, I thought it was a little too dry.
The San Pei claypot chicken was very well flavoured, however, very tasty, in a sweet soya like sauce and lots of red chilli.
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| San Pei chicken clay pot |
The steamed snapper was delicious, too and had a very interesting sauce- spicy yet not mouth burning, very flavourful. A good one, though we had to fight a little for a slightly larger portion!
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| Red snapper in Assam sauce |
Dessert was excellent. The strawberry and dark chocolate sorbets were fantastic, but the peanut butter one was delicious too. Their white chocolate mousse is a must try- airy and not oversweet.
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| White chocolate mousse |
I'm going to go out on a limb here say my experience here was lukewarm. While the food was good, it was definitely not excellent. I wonder if their specialty menu is any better – I sincerely hope so, because I do want to give them a second chance. Service was very good and polite, but unfortunately a smiling waiter doth not a Michelin Star experience make.
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