The way I will review the dining experience will take a different approach. Each dinning experience will be Mystery Shopped. That means, no one from the restaurant will know I am coming.
Disclaimer:
The restaurant did not invite me for any review. Neither I am writing a review to please anyone. This is just my personal opinions and my experiences based on this particular instance of my visit. It may not be true for others to have the similar experience like mine. But for every review, I will offer my views, recommendation and credits where it deemed fit.
Review parameters
All dining experience reviews will consists of following area:
- Conduciveness of Environment
- Overall Service standards
- Food quality and value for money
- The eating experience
The rating system for above area will be based on the following guidelines:
- 5 : Awesome Surprise
- 4 : Above expectations
- 3 : Expectations Met
- 2 : Below expectations
- 1 : Criminal
Final Overall Average Rating : 2.5 / 5
Today, I am going to review Fei Fei Crab Restaurant located in 24, Jln 5/109f, Taman Danau Desa, 58100 Kuala Lumpur.
Every Saturday, if I am in town, my family and I will have dinner with my parents. Today we passed by the restaurant and decided to give it a try. The original plan was to have Thai Food instead.
1. Conduciveness of Environment (3/5)
There are indoors and outdoors dining areas. It was around 8:00pm and the restaurant was about 80% full. Though there were some empty tables outdoors, but we decided to wait a while for tables indoors. The manager who greeted us politely ask us to wait for a while as he said that there are 2 empty tables which was reserved.
But then, we overheard another waiter said the reservation was suppose to be 7:00pm and till now the guests who reserved the table had not shown up yet. Having heard that, the Manager seemed indecisive, and seeing the opportunity, I told him to give us the table instead since the reservation is 1 hour late !
In the beginning, he was reluctant and mentioned something like “I can’t make decision, I am just a worker here..”
That’s interesting comment, I don’t expect that. That shows, this manager is not facing this type of situation for the first time and may had gotten into trouble previously.
Anyway. Let’s talk about the dining environment. I quite like the indoor setting, with good lightning and yellow table clothes. You can tell their ventilation is not too bad as you don’t feel any heat coming out from the kitchen consider we were sitting quite close to the Bar counter where they have direct access to the Kitchen.
The air-condition was good and fans were turn on to ensure guests have a comfortable dining experience.
I gave it a 3 out of 5, because this is the minimum standard for a local Chinese restaurant at a shop lot.
2. Overall Service Standard (3/5)
If not mistaken, there were at least 7 waiters / waitresses on the service floor. Mostly foreign workers, except the Manager and some guys wearing Yellow uniform (Looks like they are assistant to the Manager or some sort).
We were given the Menu and the order sheet. We suppose to write our own orders on the order sheet. But the printing on the order sheet was hard to read.
The ordering process was nothing special, but it will be great if the Manager or those in yellow uniform can come forward to offer their services to recommend what is their signature dishes and so on.
Since this restaurant suppose to be well-known for its crabs, we order 2 different flavours. One is Sweet and Spicy, and the other one was Salted Sauce Crab. To top it up, I also ordered a sweet and sour pork for Annabelle, 1 veggie and roasted pork with yam cake.
I signalled the Manager to come forward and take our orders. He was fast and quickly prompted to me that because we were ordering more than RM 180 worth of dishes, we are entitled to have 1 Free Crab dishe. That is a nice surprise, as I was not aware they are having a promotion. At least he told me.
For the rest of the evening, the dishes were served rather fast with no interruption. And this is expected. Thus the rating 3 out of 5.
3. Food quality and value for money (2/5)
I will only review 3 dishes, even though we had also a sweet and sour pork and a veggie dish.
Let’s talk about the Sweet & Spicy Crab.
First of all, they used an inappropriate plate to serve this dish. The reason I said so, is because it is not convenient to get the sauce in a small plate like this. As you can see from the picture, if you want to access the sauce, you need to remove the crabs first.
Secondly, the crab is fresh. The meat is tender. However, the overall taste is too sweet for me. However, I think Fei Fei Crab has his own recipe to differentiate its flavour from the “normal” sweet and spicy crab that you could typically find in Malaysia. This is definitely not the normal standard you will expect. Taste is subjective, some loves it, others may not. I belong to the later.
Next dish is the Salted Egg Yolk Sauce Crab.
This dish is really rich. You can definitely taste the melted salted egg yolk in a creamy thick sauce. I know there are people would love this sinful dish (LOL). I am not a really big fan of Salted Egg Yolk Sauce dishes – but since this is their Signature dish, I must give it a try.
The sauce is milky and thick. It is creamy as you can see, well-seasoned to taste, and the crab absorbed the richness of the salted egg yoke and very inviting.
However, a word of cautions. This dish is not too bad eating on its own, but is not suitable to go with rice. After 2 serving, I will find it too creamy to eat anything else. This is sad, because, I am still hungry, but I no longer feel like eating. It felt like I Just drank a class of milk. 🙁
Next dish is the Roast Pork with Peanut Chillies sauce served with Salted Egg Yolk Chicken in Yam Cake. (RM 35)
I actually quite like the flavour of the roast pork, especially it taste very special with peanut sauce fried with chillies. Something I do not commonly find in other Chinese Restaurants. However, the yam cake in the middle fails to lived up the reputation of this dish deserves.
If there is anything to improve on this dish, I would recommend to use Pork belly that comes with some fat instead of pork ribs with bone. Imagine the juiciness of the meat with your first bite, combining with the delicious peanut chillies sauce. That will be heaven.
My dad commented the cuts for the Pork Ribs is too big to handle. Discounted the experience of totally enjoying this dish.
Unfortunately, the yam cake in the center was not crispy at all. It is actually a disgrace to the entire dish. So, as a result, overall speaking, this dish is below expectation.
4. The eating experience (2/5)
I would say rooms for improvement exists. The eating experience for the crab can be better. I know it is normal for our hands to get messy, but, if the Chef can hammered the crab to smaller pieces, then we do not need to use the Crab Cracker tool in your sauce-covered-hand… Overall, the eating experience is MESSY.
So, we find it challenging to eat the crab, then we need to use the chopsticks with our messy hand to eat the rice and other dishes. We can’t be going to and fro to wash our hands, can we ?
So, overall the average rating is…
2.5 / 5
1. Conduciveness of Environment (3/5)
2. Overall Service Standard (3/5)
3. Food quality and value for money (2/5)
4. The eating experience (2/5)
Final verdict
Will we return to this restaurant ? Not for the time being.
After spending RM 243.65 for a dinner with 5 dishes including drinks etc, I find there is no value of money. Imagine RM 243.65 is included 1 Crab dish is Free of Charge. If not, it will cost me more than RM 300.00.
For a normal weekend dinner with 4 adults and 2 kids, this is too much. The worst part is, I still walk away not feeling full. 🙁
However, there are other dishes I have not tried, may be they are good?
Till next time, I shall do another mystery Food Experience Review.
