Thursday, February 1, 2007

China Nill

If I wanted to go to a glorified PF Changs, I'd hit up a suburban mall. Unfortunately, I hit up a sub-par version when I went with my sister and surrogate sis to China Grill the other night. I don't even know where to begin. Now, I'm well aware that I can be quite critical when it comes to restaurants. But my table-mates absolutely validated everything I thought and we all left with mouths wide open and a sense of shock. How could this restaurant that is deemed high quality be so damn shitty?

Starting with the decor. I would feel more hip eating at the Cheesecake factory. When your menu include $40 entrees I would think they would have the decency to boost up the ambiance. But China Grill does not. Guests sit on wicker chairs as Madonna's Erotica album plays from surround sound. While this might be amusing for my sister, I hardly think it adds a touch of class.

The service is so unattentive, I was about to print out my own check. From the get-go, we were all confused as to who are server was. A woman came over to welcome us and then neglected us for the next 20 minutes while we sat menus closed staring her down. Finally, a guy came over to pour us water. He asked can I take your drink order while you decide? Even without knowing that he apparently was our waiter as well- we took a chance and gave him our full order. He replied, "Easy enough." The phrase makes me laugh in hindsight. Is it really "easy enough" to bring out the dishes in a well-timed fashion and assure us our plates wouldn't be cold and our appetites soured? Absolutely not. I could hear him bickering in the corner to his co-worker, "I'm so over tonight!"

Our first appetizer came to the table-the crispy calamari salad. I was not impressed although my sis and sur-sis were both content. There was nothing special about it. But I waited in the hopes that then next plate would be something exciting... and then came our soggy congealed dumplings. What was in them again? I hardly remember. Maybe because all I tasted was steamed dough in a sweet and sour sauce. Before we had even finshed our appetizers, our first entree reached our table. While it sat at the edge for 5 minutes as a bus boy changed our app plates to our "entree plates", my sister took the first serve. I plucked a fried onion string from the entree plate to find it was cold and not even bordering luke warm. It turns out the entire dish was cold. So we sent it back. 2 minutes later our skirt steak with lomein got to us. This looked a bit more promising. I would go as far to say this was the best dish we ate at China Grill, but that is still not saying much. It was good but the other dishes were so unappealing, I'd still rather order in chinese take-out. Our drunken chicken returned to our table clearly reheated. As we cut into the dried-out chicken, we knew what the future already held for us. It was a gonner. Our table was cleared off and we sat joking about how terrible the dessert will have to be to finish the meal with a bang! The dessert was actually okay, but how can you fuck up sorbet? There was also some sort of mousse that was light and sweet, but nothing could candycoat the meal at that point.

Maybe we should have ordered their more popular dishes off the regular menu? But all I know is that by the end of the meal, I was happy I had only spent the restuarant week pre fix. If I had spent any more money on crap food and experience, I would be POed. I will definitely never return to China Grill. If I ever get the urge for snazzed up Chinese food, I'll go to the strip mall. At least I know the lettuce wraps at PF Changs are good.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

"While this might be amusing for my sister, I hardly think it adds a touch of class."

should I take offense to this? LOL
Erotica is dam classy let me tell you, it is! Nothing like eating out to background music about...um...eating out lol

Also the dumplings WERE very congealed and nast. I loved the description, was perfect.

Superb and accurate review on a restuarant that was so nil.
Never again, I'll say that much.

Unknown said...

Def do not take offense my dear sis. I love the Erotica CD-but time and place my friend...time and place.

Lo said...

I am LingOL like a mofo!!! First of all, I love Erotica too, but I don't think I want to eat to orgasmic "uuuhhhh" sounds! Haha. Great review. I will never waste my time there.

This was the first time I did RW and I have to say I had two very pleasant meals - One if By Land, Two if By Sea was pretty delish and classy in an old fashioned American way and Fredericks Madison was also very classy in a French sort of way. The way gourmet cuisine should be! And isn't that the whole point of RW?

Lo said...

Oh I meant to say I will never waste my time or MY CALORIES there...haha!

Unknown said...

You are right on. CALORIES!

Anonymous said...

yay! the positiove one if by land two if by sea review gets me excited...