You know, most of the time buying online discount coupons for restaurants you have never heard of is not a good move. I saw the 1-for-1 buffet deal for 4 & a Half Gourmands and bought it straight away without reading any reviews (GASP!), and I regretted immediately after because I very intelligently went to check out the reviews.
Apparently, there's no good reviews online. I was so scared it's going to be a bad experience for both kengyang and I. But being the rational one, he told me how sometimes online reviews were not trustable and that we should just go to the restaurant with an open mind.
I also went through all the photos on Instagram with the hashtag "4andahalfgourmands" and I was so thankful to the food blogger who replied my question so quickly and assured me that the place wasn't as bad as it was virtually painted to be.
So... I went and guess what, IT WASN'T THAT BAD LE. I actually quite enjoyed the food!
I think the fact that I went on a Sunday afternoon also helped because there were only a few customers dining and so the service was quite good! And since there's no blog reviews on the restaurant online, I have decided to write one! And yes, it's a average-positive review!
4 & a Half Gourmands Bistro Bar is located at Hong Kong Street! :)
Drinks were not included in the deal, so here's a photo of my man ordering his drinks. Also, I don't know if you can notice from the reflection, the bistro bar is quite small.
I can see how people will complain about bad service during peak times lah. There were only 2 waiters when we were there, so if during peak times there were also only 2 waiters, then you can't really expect them to be attentive to everyone every time right?
What 4 & a Half Gourmands should do is to hire more staff or part-time staff for peak shifts!
My Iced Green Tea Latte was good. I like how I can control the sweetness myself!
For the buffet, we had two sections that we can choose from, one section had items that could only be ordered once, while the other section allowed multiple orders.
So, we ordered everything. :D Well, except mashed potatoes.
The grilled mushrooms looked terrible, but they tasted good, so we polished the plate instantly!
The best dish has got to be the quail egg dumplings. The sauce was so addictive!
Some prawn dish that was so-so. I have to praise the restaurant for the super fresh prawns though!
Kengyang didn't like the buffalo wings because it tasted unlike all the other buffalo wings that we have tasted. I was fine with these wings, but I gotta agree that after a while, I couldn't eat anymore because there was too much seasoned flour.
Tempura mushrooms. I love to dip these in the sauce that came with the quail egg dumplings. Kengyang didn't fancy this dish, so I finished it! :D
The Vietnamese Wings were Kengyang's favourite and he ordered this twice. It was good, but I couldn't eat anymore wings after tackling the buffalo wings.
Mushroom soup was definitely instant. However, I didn't mind it being instant because I was paying so little for the meal. It's all about how you rationalise the situation. It's a buffet, where one person pays around S$8 for unlimited food. You can't really expect gourmet standard soup right? It was good, it was tasty despite being instant, and so I was satisfied.
If you paid more for a buffet and you get instant food, then you can start firing your complaining guns.
Carbonara pasta was alright, albeit a wee bit tasteless. The solution that we came up with was to spoon a little bit of the soup over the pasta. Case solved! :)
I didn't like the squid ink pasta because the pasta came a little over al dente. Kengyang loved it though, so he was in charge of finishing it.
The garlic bread. Where do I start with these glorious pieces of garlic bread. They were quite honestly the best garlic bread that I have ever eaten in my life. I had to order these again because they were so good!
SERIOUSLY BEST GARLIC BREAD EVER.
The pizzas were not good. They were instant and they were done terribly. I'm quite sure when I make my own instant pizza at home, it will tast much better than these.
We didn't finish the pizzas unfortunately.
And that concludes my boyfriend's birthday celebration! So glad that I gave the restaurant a try. It honestly was not that bad. I'm glad I'm writing a moderately positive review about the restaurant because I think I'm the only one with positive comments!
If you are new to this blog, please take note that all reviews are my own and I'm not paid to intentionally write positive things and fabricate stories.
Yay, glad to have spent the day with this man and hope you had a great birthday this year, Mr Chung! :)
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