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2015-06-09
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First off, I must say that I have never been to any other of The Coffee Academics' chains in Hong Kong, so this isn't written with the general standard of TCA in mind. Seeing that The Pulse has opened within walking distance from my home, I was excited to try the restaurants there so that we have more options when food is short at home. Although it's a nicely designed and cozy coffee shop, there are a few downsides that I could already foresee the first time I came in during the colder months of
Seeing that The Pulse has opened within walking distance from my home, I was excited to try the restaurants there so that we have more options when food is short at home.
Although it's a nicely designed and cozy coffee shop, there are a few downsides that I could already foresee the first time I came in during the colder months of 2015. The feature of the design is its complete openness, as if the other side of the entrance was the inside of a mall where air cond would be blasting at full speed. This makes it rather nice, as you get a nice view of the beach. When we went in April and later, though, there were lots of mosquitos and flying insects, making the experience rather unpleasant as I kept having to reach down to take care of my itchy bare legs. It also seems rather economically and environmentally unsustainable to regulate the temperature inside the shop with this design.
TCA gave off the impression that its specialty was tea and coffee, but all of the overpriced coffee and tea beverages that I've had in the past few visits have been underwhelming. One was the Okinawa salt coffee which, to me, seemed as if they simply dropped a few salts into a cup of average coffee. The mint tea was even worse. Except for the fancy teaware that comes with their eccentric repertoire of tea-related drinks, the tea itself is not much better than those made from teabags. They do have a rather unique drinks menu though--that I give them the credit. The food menu, on the other hand, is incredibly limited, and things take way too long to be prepared. A lot of the times when I pop down to TCA, I want something quick and simple, but something simple still takes them half an hour or more. This time, I went with my mother for a fish tacos and a caesar salad, and both took over 60 minutes when the cafe was empty (granted, there was one other table with a couple, but that's it). The food always tasted okay but overall, it seems like management still needs some time to get the hang of things.
Repulse Bay Road is practically 5x as congested on the weekend thanks to tourists who are all coming in to the beach and to The Pulse, but even on the weekend, you'll find TCA to be less than a quarter full, when Limewood and Classified next door, charging double or triple the price, have a full house. There is probably a good reason why.
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