EatTilHappy: chinese food

Haven't been updating the blog since laziness got the better of me, but I just had to write a review for this. Jin Shan is a Chinese restaurant, located on the main floor of the MBS hotel, which suggests it's pretty good. Unfortunately it's the opposite. To summarise Jin Shan, it has poor service, sub-par food but worse, it operates like a scammer. Wanna know why? Scroll to the bottom.

But to be fair, let us talk about Jin Shan does to draw customers. Other than its prime location to attract hotel guests, it has a reasonably priced 5 course lunch set for $38++.

Looks pretty good right? Sad to say that Jin Shan's lunch set is pretty bad, even if we disregard the fact that it's located in a five-star hotel.

Set B: Barbequed Trio Combination

Very ordinary appetiser. Didn't help that the meat was on the cold side.

Set A: Dim Sum Trio

One of the better courses of the set. Their dim sum is quite dainty and the ingredients such as the prawns that they use is fresh.

Set B: Minced Chicken with Millet in Golden Soup

Probably the best part of the meal, this soup is extremely flavorful and savory. The texture of soup is in a good place as it strikes a good balance of not being overly thick or thin. The presentation is exquisite, although the portion size is deceptively smaller than expected. Nonetheless probably the only enjoyable part of the lunch set.

Set A: Shredded Dumpling Delicacy in Supreme Soup

A rather plain dish that pales in comparison to the richer flavour of Set A's soup. However, I would think that people who prefer more bland food would prefer this soup over the earlier one.

Set B: Fried Pork Ribs in Honey Sauce

To be fair, I don't normally like my meat being sweetish (save for bakkwa), but this is pretty average. The meat was generally tender but "ruined" by the sugary sweetness. Would probably be better if it was converted to coffee ribs.

Set A: Fried Prawns with Spiced-Salt

The good? Huge prawn, generous amount of spices. The bad? Prawn itself could not be seasoned thoroughly and was not very fresh. Decent dish for prawn lovers.

Set B: Stir Fried Sliced Fish in Sichuan Style with Rice

Easily the worst part of the set. I don't know what they were trying to achieve with this dish. It says Sichuan style and has some dried chilli, but I taste no spiciness. What I got was dish that was sugary sweet that is far from being Sichuan Style. Simply bad.

Set A: Steamed Sea Perch with Preserved Turnip and Noodles

This is definitely a lot better than the fish and rice dish above. The sea perch is what the sliced fish above should have been. It's lightly seasoned and compliments the carbohydrate side, which is tasty on its own.The noodles was respectfully soft

Set B: Red Bean Soup

Very average. No texture to the soup, overly sweet and barely any beans.

Set A: Chilled Cream of Fresh Fruits Sago

The fresh fruit was honey melon but that was only the flavour. It was pretty much eating foam laced with some sugar. Shouldn't be calling it cream or sago.

Overall comments:

For $38++, this five-course meal is pretty good... except the food is bad. What's worse was that the staff had the audacity of charging my party of 4 a $20 miscellaneous fee ($5 per pax). When asked what this fee was about, the staff mentioned it was because of the pickles and tea...Wait, what tea? Everybody only ordered water and we only had a measly mini-plate of pickled vegetables. How did it come up to $5 per pax? If this isn't scammer behavior I don't know what is.

Only upon further investigation and firm words did the manager address the issue and reduce the charge to $11, with each person being charged $2 for water and towel ($1 for each item) plus $3 for the pickles. In any case, the original charge was deliberately ambiguous. Even the revised amount had some cover up as many other five-star restaurants don't even charge for towels.

I normally already don't agree with Chinese restaurants charging for pickles/peanuts especially when many Western restaurants offer complimentary bread baskets. This meal with Jin Shan reinforced my opinion that it's about time consumers take a stand against being forced to pay for pickles that were not requested for. It's even worse when the restaurant tries to charge day-light robbery prices for it.

I would say that Jin Shan's practices are a disgrace to Singapore. I would feel extremely embarrassed if tourists who are less savvy with our practices even see this "miscellaneous" charge.

Honestly, Jin Shan should have better ways of attracting its customers. Yes, $38++ is pretty "value" for money for its lunch set. However, the $5 per pax "miscellaneous" charge is obviously a scam.

Jin Shan's food quality is sub-par. Its slow service didn't help it in any way. This is the last time I'll patronage this disgrace of a high-end Chinese restaurant.

Rating: Placed on my ban-list due to their unscrupulous practices

Moi Lum is a family-style Cantonese restaurant that has a long history. They have several specialty dishes which I'll highlight later. If you are planning to eat your dinner after 6pm, it's safer to make a reservation as the staff was initially hesitant to give us a table at 530pm despite the restaurant having only one table occupied.

Fried Salmon Skin with Salted Egg

Really crispy and a sensible amount of salted egg seasoning. Would highly recommend this as a starter. Price is acceptable.

Pork Belly wrapped with Lettuce

I forgot what the actual name is but this is basically pork wrapped with lettuce. The meat wasn't overly fat but I wasn't particularly fond of the sweetish sauce. A decent choice if you like pork though.

Beancurd and vegetables

Forgot the name and the dish was so-so. Although it's alright if you don't want to overload on meat.

"legendary" Crispy Fried Chicken (Signature Dish)

Easily lives up to its name. The skin was crisp but the meat still remained succulent enough. One of the better roasted chickens around.

Golden Coin Beancurd (Signature Dish)

Strangely reminds me of a fusion between luncheon meat (not necessarily a bad thing) and a quiche. This is really good, as the dish is extremely flavorful. I feel that the density of the "coin" emphasizes the strong flavor and makes the dish seem to be of a higher quality (than if it was less dense).

General Comments:
Quite a quaint place where you can enjoy authentic Cantonese cuisine. I'm generally a fan of Chinese food and this place did not disappoint. Prices were pretty decent as well. Be sure to try the signature dishes. If I recall correctly, the charge for tea is on the high side (which sort of explains why the staff religiously kept refilling our teacups.)