I consider the Lookout Restaurant as fine dining. Therefore I am a little more strict on the performance. Looking at the restaurant closely, everything they do is in unison. From courteous service to delectable food, everything I have experienced have been tastefully designed. Adding the astonishing view to that makes the Lookout Restaurant at Gray Monk one of the best restaurants. Everyone should at least try it once in their life time.
We ordered some skewers. They were $10 per 10, so $1 per skewer. When I bite into it, the meat doesn’t break off easily. I think they were using the leftover part of the cow. The textures are not consistent. There are bits of pockets of meat among the webs of something really difficult to chew. I was not impressed.
It is Din Tai Fung culture to serve pot stickers upside down to showcase the crispy bottom crust. The extravagant thin crisp crust hide the pot stickers underneath. When you eat them, you estimate where pot stickers are and break the crust accordingly. It provides excitement to eating an ordinary dish. Unfortunately for the Din Tai Fung in Seattle, I broke the bottom crust and knew this is not the right stuff. The crust should have been light, fluffy and crispy. This crust was soggy. I could not break it off easily because the top layer of the bottom crust was still wet. This is not cooked properly. The Shrimp and Kurotuba Pork Pot Stickers pot stickers should be soft and juicy to the bite. The real Din Tai Fung’s potstickers should have a bounce and give me a satisfying feeling when biting into them. However, the texture of the pot stickers can only be best described as “wimpy”. I don’t care if it’s Kurotuba Pork or whatever the pork they use. I cannot taste the difference. If you want to use prestige ingredients, customers should be able to differentiate it in the taste. Also something of note, shrimp does not have much texture.
It is quite ironic to name the restaurant “Happy Tree”. I’d be pretty pissed if I were the trees. Happy Tree House BBQ make very good lamb skewers. Unfortunately, everything else is pure trash. The interior of the space is very noisy, you cannot hear what your friends are saying. The service is not very good, all the staff wants to do is get you to finish so they can serve the next round of customers. Even with these issues, I still see a lot of customers lining up. I cannot justify the $46 per person price point. Not recommended due to high price, bad food, bad atmosphere, and bad service.
Big Tree Food Palace is not a very good restaurant. Our bill comes to $130 for 4 people with 15% tips. A bill of $150 for 4 equals to $37 per person. I don’t care if their rent is high. Their food quality is not worth $37 per head. The ingredients are sub-par. The majority of the food is slightly overcooked. I’m not sure if it’s bad to a point of “must-try”, but I think customers know when they eat something over-priced. The bad food quality of this restaurant would be acceptable if it’s $18 per person. Not recommended.
