Fine Dining?

Forgive me for praying to the altars of practicalism, there are so many things I don't get here in Malaysia (boleh-land is so overused, enough already).

My gripe for today is the pretentiousness of restaurants and their patrons.

There's so many restaurants around branding themselves as fine dining, I somehow feel the title is diluted now. If you're expecting the kind of service par excellence, you'll be disappointed. If you are expecting food that will delight your senses, you'll be even more disappointed. The service is supposed to be quick, attentive, yet non-intrusive while the food is expected to look nice, taste good and just enough to sate your hunger but not filling you up. At least that what I learnt from hours of watching and reading about Gordon Ramsay, Ferran Adria, Alain Ducasse and Michel Roux.

I've tried several and they ultimately let me down on both counts. Try asking a recommendation from the waiter, they'll randomly point to something on the menu (which is probably printed as Chef's recommendation in the first place). See, if I wanted the Chef's recommendation, I wouldn't have asked you innit? And try asking them which main course would complement the aforementioned starter, and a sheepish smile would just be followed by another random finger pointing. I expect a reasoning why it's your recommendation, and I expect you to show me confidence even if you know shit about what you are saying. If I drink wine, I'm sure the waiter would mumble their way through the list too. Perhaps, you can recommend a nice cheese to go along with that '77 Cabernet? You wish.

And the food, it's a tragedy. It's a travesty! Now is it any wonder they restaurants are always dimly lighted (atmospheric my ass), if you can see clearly you'll be put off. The portions are always ridiculously small, definitely not adhering to the sating-not-filling thingy. Perhaps somewhere along the way, fine-dining was translated to the-smaller-the-better. The garnishing often looks out of place and redundant, the taste is usually bland with a sprinkle of boring on top.

The decor are always generic, with the same furniture, theme and look-feel as the next one. Given, some places actually does excel in the decor section, but give it a few months then other copycats will emerge. Ohh don't trust the pictures on their websites too, a good photographer can make any dumpster look that nice given the right angle and lighting.

The patrons are somewhat a sad sight too. The yuppies in their expensive shirts and the flavour-of-the-week in tow decked in a pretty dress and a million dollar smile to boot, it would be nice if it's not so generic yet again. Everyone would try hard to look as rich and snobbish as they can, swing that Birkin, smoke that Cuban if you can. In the dim, I mean atmospheric, lighting even SPGs can look pretty. Oh I forgot to mention the SPGs! They can be found by the bucketloads, hanging on to their mat salleh boyfriends as though he might vanish in thin air should she let go. Kutuk SPG kena bukak post lain lah I think, hehe.

Despite all this I do still go to these places once in a while, just to try something new and perhaps I might stumble on to a gem of a place that won't disappoint for once. I have some recommendations too if you're looking for a nice place, ask me personally and I shall share. Better still, share with me if you have a recommendation. Otherwise, I'd rather save the money and go to casual dining places like Italiannies in One Utama where the food is always good and the service never disappoints. Or better still head down to your nearest mamak, for fast service at relatively cheap prices (not so cheap now wor these mamak places, no wonder they're making so much money).

Hrmm, teringat ayam madu and telur ikan goreng Pelita...