DeathSlam

Bump

Been to Sushi Shikon in HK a couple of times (expensive but good), Lung King Heen at the Four Seasons (wasn't as wowed by the dim sum as I'd hoped) and Sushi Saito in Tokyo (excelent and cheaper than HK) and so I'm keen to hear reports of the HK branch.

sig05

Had dinner the other night at Sepia 1* in Chicago. We heard good things and they had a prix fixe menu for Restaurant Week.

I started with the duck liver mousse, which so-so. Lots of mousse and two very small pieces of bread. The ricotta cavatell was superb, and I really enjoyed the pesto sauce. The main was a pork sausage crepinette - the sausage was definitely tough / chewy - the fried oysters were delicious. The chocolate mousse dessert was probably the best chocolate mousse I've had. Overall, the food was good, but the service was lackluster. I'm not sure if this was because it's restaurant week but it was off. Little things like giving people the wrong food - two of the four courses only 1 out of 5 had the right plate put in front of them. When refilling water, they would dribble all over the table - not a big deal, I get it things happen. Lastly, one of my friends was celebrating his birthday and the waitress confirmed his name at the beginning and middle of dinner service. She brings out his dessert with the standard happy birthday, NAME!! on the plate. However, the name on the plate isn't even close to his name.

We thought it was rather humorous because things like this happen my friend, so we were all laughing. The waitress was embarrassed but didn't say much other than I can't believe they (kitchen) did this. We stopped at the bar on the way out to have a nightcap, and a manager stopped by to ask how dinner was. We said good and relayed the story of the wrong name dessert. His only response was oh, glad you enjoyed the meal.

For the same money, I would go to Black Bird which is also one star. Even Girl & the Goat was far superior and a must-do on every return trip to CHI.

PsiFighter37

Ended up being excellent as always. The winter tasting menu is really spot-on. Enjoyed a 2013 vintage of Goose Island's Bourbon County Rye Stout along with the meal...hard to get better than that.

Rudi

new ** Restaurants:
** Focus Park Hotel Vitznau
** Pavillon Hotel Baur au Lac, Zürich

New * Restaurants
* La Brezza Hotel Eden Roc, Ascona
* Roots Basel
* Le Café Suisse Bex
* Zur Gedult Burgdorf
* L'Etoile –Nova Charmey
* Gasthaus zum Kreuz Dallenwil
* Le Berceau de Sens Lausanne
* Neue Blumenau Lömmenschwil
* Jakobs Esszimmer Hotel Jakob, Rapperswil
* Tredecim Hotel Restaurant Krone, Sihlbrugg
* Ritzcoffier Bürgenstock Resort, Obbürgen
* La Régence-Balavaud Vétroz
* Sens Hotel Vitznauerhof, Vitznau
* Paul's by Schützelhofer Widnau
* Alpine Gourmet Prato Borni Grand Hotel Zermatterhof, Zermatt
* Gustav Zürich
* Ornellaia Zürich
* 20/20 by Mövenpick Zürich

GadgetFreak

Eastbay1K

I like CP very much. Unfortunately, for some, it isn't going to be the 13 course militaristic dining marathon that certain people seek in their fine dining. It is also a fraction of the price of many of those places. It is just good fresh food done right, with a lovely wine list priced fairly.

https://sf.eater.com/2019/2/6/182140...-san-francisco

I wonder if this is going to affect restaurant morale ... or perhaps it already has.

jbeans

Seems like all signs are pointing to Benu!

elg26

Re Hong Kong Michelin restaurants:

It was brought up in another Forum that the "star rating of Hong Kong restaurants is not in any way comparable with the rating in Europe for example. A three Michelin star restaurant in Hong Kong would most likely not get awarded with more than one star (or less)."

Do others agree with this statement?

Ive eaten at alot of the top restaurants in Hong Kong with alot of positive results, but Im not going to pretend im a world traveling Michelin foodie....that is why I ask.

GadgetFreak

I agree for the most part. However, you make it sound a bit like a nice diner and it is obviously far above that. It is incredibly creative, locally sourced food at a place that, it could be argued pretty persuasively, invented the California Cuisine and really modern American fine dining. I think it would be very difficult to argue it isn't the most influential American restaurant of the last 50 years.

phant0m

Maybe they're pretentious and don't like the fact that hole in the wall spots can have 1*s? I will say that the majority of my Michelin dining experiences in Europe from 1* to 3* have all been fine dining.

Eastbay1K

I don't disagree with you, and am spoiled to be able to take a leisurely walk there for dinner should I want some exercise. I'm just highlighting what I believe most complainers of the restaurant are complaining about.

offerendum

I only had dinner at 2 restaurants so can´t speak in general. One was Lung King Heen. I found it hard to rate as it´s very different from normal Michelin starred restaurants. I had dinner at a 1 star Cantonese restaurant in Paris and must say compared to this Lung King Heen was definitively a level above.

Other retaurant was Caprice which had 2 stars at this time. I wasn´t really impressed but wouldn´t say it was a 1 star.

DeathSlam

This same 'star value' comment has been applied to Japan as well.

I won't pretend I eat at M* restaurants all the time but I've been to a few in Europe and a few in Asia.

If we talk about restaurants like air travel, the M* process gives consideration to both the hard product and the soft product.
Soft=food
Hard=Ambience, service, decor., location..

The 1* being referred to is a chain of dim sum restaurants called Tim Ho Wan. I really like their BBQ buns
http://www.timhowan.com/dim-sum/yangzhou-fried-rice/
but whether they truly deserve a star based on just this when their Hard product is non existent I would dispute.

3* it's difficult to think that any of them are as inventive or creative as some of the European places and I probably wouldn't drive hundreds of miles for them (which was the original intention of the star rating) but there is a good hard product in several of them. Sushi Shikon is an exception to that though. People fly in from abroad just to eat there and then fly home.

Despite the name of this thread I think we all know that there are some amazing restaurants that don't have M* for various reasons. So there are commercial and cultural forces at play so you can expect regional variation in how *s are awarded.

I should say that Michelin deny this.

offerendum

Indeed! There are also the cutlery and red cutlery

DeathSlam

I'm not convinced that the fork and star ratings are as orthogonal as pledged,
[Puts on flame proof suit]