Esquire Kitchen, Kuala Lumpur

The dinner I had in this large restaurant was not an enjoyable one. I have hitherto rued my decision to dine there with my brother and his wife .

I ordered sweet and sour pork, fried egg plants and braised home-made Bean curds. All the three dishes were a disappointment. From the texture of the sweet and sour pork, I can tell that the meat had been blanched in hot water first without any marination.It was strong with an unpleasant odour and I could only have one bite of it . Besides, it tasted quite bitter because the meat was 60% burnt from over-frying.The use of vinegar was a mite too much, making the dish unpleasantly sour with only a little sweetness.

The bean curd dish,the second one served, brought more woe to our taste buds. Obviously, the bean curds had been kept in the refrigerator for days before taken directly out for deep-frying. It was unprepossessing with hardly any gravy and a little sprinkle of minced meat. My sister in law complained that they were tasteless and we could not agree more. The third dish -fried egg plants(Yii Xiang Cheah Tze) tasted slightly better. They were sweet, soft but too oily.

More annoyingly, the serving of each dish was too little and the rice was Half-Cooked! I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw that I had to pay almost RM55 for the mediocre meal on the receipt print-out.

The air-conditioning was weak that night and many diners were smoking. The elderly waitresses were mostly impatient and rude while taking orders save the one attending to us. The one at a neighbouring table was shamelessly rude. She scolded her customers for being indecisive.

Though the 'A-Graded' restaurant is widely known in Malaysia for its delicious food, my experience there tells me that it does not live up to its fame. I wonder if the foods we ate had been prepared by 'apprentice cooks'.

It's better eating fast food and Indian food in Kuala Lumpur. The foods are more reasonably priced, and are more filling.