Sunday, September 27, 2009

District 10 Disaster

hmmm how shall i begin?

Dinner at District 10 was, regrettably, the worst dining experience for a pair of food kakis by far. Never did we anticipate things to escalate this way.




One thing's for sure, the central dining section was tamed for a charming alfresco atmosphere. But with null reservations, (not that we didn't try..we were told reservations were full) you get assigned to a desolate area blending with the former school's common premises. It just felt... improper.




Have you ever ordered a dish for a particular something, but to your dis-delight, the thing never showed?

I could find greens, marinated mushrooms, feta cheese, roasted roma tomatoes, parmesan flakes and bland balsamic dressing in the District 10 Salad ($12). Everything but walnuts. Boo.





The chef's signature Country Style Roasted Baby Back Ribs ($24) served with fries, had no typical barbeque/marmite/honey sauce slathered. Instead it employed a risky crust of wholegrain mustard, which happens to not be everyone's cup of tea. In this case my friend was shunned off by the wasabi-like pungency.





Now for the serious rant.


Because Lemon Sole ran out, i opted for the waiter-recommended Fish of the day ($25)- checked and double-confirmed to be a grilled RED SNAPPER fillet.

What arrived was an appalling dish of fried noodles. I approached a waitress for a explanation of the components, who promised to return with someone more knowledgeable but never did. So i tucked in and configured it on my own...


1) The fish was obviously NOT a snapper. Any fish-eating person can tell it's salmon.

2) Atrociously fishy. So unbearable that i left half of it untouched (wasting seafood is never my thing)

3) The noodles were maggie/wanton-meeish in character and awfully drowned in grease that it scares me. A spaghetti at least, could have saved its image by a million counts.

4) Effortless toss of shrimps, mango & lychee in thai dressing failed to abide. Everything just didn't flow into a cohesive picture.


I never felt so compelled to oppose a dish to this extent, really.






Project Dessert-to-the-rescue didn't suppress our grouses. The White Chocolate & Strawberry Cheesecake ($10) fared mediocre atop gritty digestive base and melted down to a pannacotta mush in a short timespan. Only liked the accompanying wild berries compote.


When time to exit, the card system was down. You could only pass if you're (i) an american express cardholder, (ii) cash loaded.

We were neither.


The sticky issue only resolved after a 30-minute long haul. Our fish dish was eventually voided & the manager gave a brief apology.




here's what kaki came out with to make up for the absence of a candlelight haha!



When such bad scenarios slaps at you, you can only fall back on the quality company for the meal. My kaki agreed.



District 10 Bistro.Wine.Bar
10 Windstedt Road
#01-17
6738 4788

6 comments:

  1. Sounds really bad. I've never heard you so outraged before!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Did you return the fish?
    I would have...

    Better to voice your disgrunt there and then so as it provide feedback for them.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I was like "huh? that's a snapper?" when I saw the photo 1st without reading. Only after reading then I realised they served you salmon instead! Hmm, it's perplexing how can they mix up snapper with salmon.. Just the colour alone is enough to differentiate them!

    Maybe they are still in the "confusion" stage, being a new restaurant..

    ReplyDelete
  4. ice: yup mainly because i would have expected such a dish to emerge from their kitchen.. it was just inappropriate to be serving that style n quality of food.. worse, to charge $25 for it. really disappointed ):


    yixiao: nope we didn't return the dish .. the restaurant was really busy for the night and nobody gave us the attention. maybe it just wasn't our day cos ive only heard good stuffs about them on hgw.


    mfs: yea exactly haha! and funniest of all, the order was keyed in as a red snapper (as printed on the receipt too), but the manager claimed they never had red snapper in the bistro at all!

    what a baffling joke =p

    ReplyDelete
  5. oo.. did u all saw tis wk de iweekly? they recom District 10.. their "chilli crab pizza"..
    iweekly giv damn gd comments for them..
    after saw ur worst experience..
    me dun feel going le..

    ReplyDelete
  6. hi bee, nice to hear from you (:

    nope i haven't seen the article, but i do see plenty of positive reviews around. Perhaps they were still new when i went... and the place is really nice to chill, so u should try them out!

    And if you really do, tell me how your experience went ok?

    ReplyDelete

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