Mien Tay
Having been quite dissapointed by my last visit for Vietnemese food along Kingsland road, or 'Pho Mile' as it has been nicknamed, i decided to visit Mien Tay as i had heard lots of positive reviews.
When we arrived at the restaurant it was packed out, which i was shocked by as it was early on a Sunday evening. We were seated quickly, however we were left to our own devices perusing the menu for about 20 minutes before anyone even asked us if we would like a drink.
The menu was vast, at first i was quite excited by the amount of choice on the menu, then i became a little dubious as to how they could possibly offer all of these dishes without the quality of the food suffering somewhat. For starters we opted for one dish to share and chose chargrilled quail with garlic, honey and spices as i read that this was one of their most popular dishes.
We seemed to be waiting a long time for this dish to arrive, and although the restaurant was very busy, i couldn't understand why one starter could be taking so long. When it did arrive it looked appetising, the flavour of the meat was quite pleasant, but i think the chilli overwhelmed it all a bit and i couldn't detect much of the honey flavour. The amount of small bones was also a bit fiddly to chomp around, therefore we finished the dish both feeling hungry and also frustrated by the poor service we had been receiving.
The service seemed to keep on getting worse during the course of the evening. We waited abot 20 minutes for the main course, looking on as the table next to us who arrived after us, had pretty much eaten up and were paying their bill. When we asked a staff member where our food was he looked at us slightly confused, dissapeared off somewhere only to return and say that we had been pretty much forgotten about, and our food would be coming soon.
By this point i didn't really want to stay and would have gladly left if it wasn't for the fact that it would have meant another trip to go and find somewhere else to eat.
When our main meals arrived, there was no apology for the delay, however all i wanted to do was tuck in. We ordered crispy sea bream with lemongrass and chilli, stirfried mince pork with aubergine and stirfried noodles with beansprouts. The fish looked really nice, and tasted quite good, i liked the light fragrant fish sauce it was sitting on, although i was a bit dissapointed that i couldn't taste the lemongrass much. I would have also prefered the fish to have been filleted to save time.
I took one bite of the minced pork and aubergine dish and in all honesty it was one of the blandest dishes i have ever tasted. The sauce was very synthetic and the whole colour of the dish was extremely unnapetising. The meat tasted like it was very poor quality and the aubergine didn't have that lovely smokey flavour you would expect. It was a complete crime against the wonderful aubergine, and i couldn't have continued to eat it.
The noodles were fairly standard, the crispy onions on the top were a nice touch though.
I was so suprised by all the positive reviews of this restaurant, and i thought that the total bill of £29.00 was too expensive for the quality of the food and service received.
Naru
www.narurestaurant.com
We enjoyed a much more pleasant experience at Naru, a Korean restaurant right at the top of Shaftesbury Avenue. The atmosphere in the restaurant was relaxing, and our waiter for the evening soon put us at ease with his friendly service and complementary tap water.
After a very long perusal of the menu we chose starters of traditional Korean pancake with seafood and spring onion and sweet potato and enoki mushroom noodle spring rolls. Both these dishes were great. I loved the mixture of soft and crispy textures of the pancake, and the filling was very generous. The rolls were wonderfully crisp and the enoki mushrooms and noodles were a really nice soft texture in contrast to the crisp outside. The only thing that could have made it better would have been somekind of dipping sauce on the side.
I can't actually remember the name of this dish. However, it consisted of rice noodles, rice cakes, white fish, shitake mushrooms, and was strangely topped with cheese. On the menu it said that this was a traditional Korean dish so i was interested to try it out. It was hot and spicy, packed with chilli, the noodles and ricecakes providing a nice chewy texture, great to soak up the rich sauce. Courgette and carrott ribbons adding a bit of crunch and freshness to the dish. I am still not sure about that cheese topping though!
Total price £23
One of my favourite places along Edgeware road, 'Meya Meya' an unassuming Egyptian takeaway. Doesn't look like much from the outside but it does really interesting Egyptian dishes at reasonable prices. One of the best things about Meya Meya however, is their feteer. An egyptain style pizza which you can have with various sweet and savoury fillings.
Here is a rather lovely chocolate and coconut cream version, mmmm!!
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