29 April, 2008

Restaurant Review: Jasmine Moon

Living in South Mumbai sometimes has a downside to it. There are limited restaurants and if you start liking something there is a good possibility that it will shut down soon. And so, every time you want to dine out the search begins for a place the taste buds would have not touched before.

Last Saturday night a few friends decided to experiment a new place called Jasmine Moon located bang in the middle of Colaba Market. The surroundings tend to put you off especially if you land up there during dinner time. Anyways being familiar with the place we all crawled into this tiny triangular shaped chinese restaurant with the center table given to our group.

The asparagus soup was a disaster and trust me I have tasted much better soup in some clubs of Mumbai - Radio Club (next door neighbour) being the best example. The Crispy Mixed Vegetables was strictly ok. Main course comprised of Burnt Garlic Rice (I think the best dish of the night), Tofu in black sauce (nice soft tofu but the sauce was tasteless - no salt, spice). The Singapore styled noodles seemed they were sun-dried before serving and only a good helping of soya sauce with chili sauce helped us eat the damn thing. To spice up things we ordered the Vegetables in Schezwan sauce (extra spicy). I don't know what the chef was thinking but he just sprinkled the dish with a lot of raw red chili pieces and sent it out. Not that the dish would have tasted any better but the chili made even more difficult to push it down the throat with the chili hurting you. In general the food was bland, tasteless and boring if I may call it. The fresh lime soda I ordered to help me wash down the dinner tasted like limbu pani made earlier in the day.

Conclusion: The place lacks a location advantage and does nothing to appeal the diner. If the chef does not do something seriously soon to improve his dishes he is going to be unemployed soon. Unfortunately this place does not even make it my "nice home delivery Chinese place".