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2013-10-22
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When I first tried this place earlier in the year I loved it, my gf and I had a different pasta each, and a glass of wine, it was all very very nice, and not too pricey, but then again it is more of a cafe feel than a restaurant, so the price should reflect that.My last 3 visits have put me off going again.Visit 2 a few weeks ago - I had their creamy chicken pasta. Far too much cream, far too rich, and very difficult to eat a lot. Any Italian creamy pasta base must also be quite light to avoid b
My last 3 visits have put me off going again.
Visit 2 a few weeks ago - I had their creamy chicken pasta. Far too much cream, far too rich, and very difficult to eat a lot. Any Italian creamy pasta base must also be quite light to avoid being too filling, so I was very disappointed with this dish and could not finish more than half of it, and I felt very bloated afterwards.
Visit 3 shortly after that - I saw a screen near entrance showing they do paninis for take out, so I went there a few days later and asked for a take away lunch. The waitress said we do not offer take out. So I took her to the screen and showed her where it said take out available. This is poor staff training, if their staff do not even know what they are advertising and offering!
Rather than just say ok sorry, she asked me to wait one minute, and went over to a manager type person and talked to him. He then came over and invited me to sit down and asked me to read the menu to choose my take away item. This was much more professional.
I chose their bbq chicken salad, which on the menu sounded delicious. In reality when I got back to my office and opened it, I was looking at the blandest/plainest looking salad I had ever seen, nothing like the Italian tasty description on the menu. The chicken was in tiny diced cubes like a bad school dinner, and covered in a small amount of what tasted like supermarket bbq sauce. The salad itself was simipy lettuce and tomato as far as I recall, with no dressing or seasoning. For an Italian themed cafe/restaurant, this did not reflect any style of Italian cooking whatsoever, and seemed to be nothing like the attractive menu description.
I was hoping after trying this salad that Fiat Caffe would become a regular take away lunch spot for me, due to their salads and paninis being very tasty, but it seemed I was wrong about this, and I immediately vowed never to have a take away salad lunch from them again. The salad was definitely not worth the charge of almost HKD 90 either. If it would have had big chunks of tasty grilled chicken, and Italian style salad, like the menu description, then maybe my opinion would have been different, but the chicken was the plainest and most boring tiny cubes I have ever eaten. An Italian person would have laughed in their faces had they seen this salad, and would no doubt have refused to pay.
Visit 4 today - I hadn't tried a panini yet, so I thought I would try today. I arrived there to be the only person in the cafe. I ordered a cheese, mushroom, and tomato panini, and a latte. The latte came quickly around the same time that a woman and her young son came in. A salad arrived for them shortly after, and it took over 15 minutes for my panini to arrive.
Considering there were no other people in the caffe, and a few chefs visible in the kitchen, I was surprised that they could not get the panini done it less than 10 minutes.
When it arrived I was quite shocked. It was tiny, like a child's portion size. For HKD 68 it should have been a lot bigger. I also could not see any filling, as there was hardly any inside, so it was not visible from the sides of the panini. Not at all attractive to look at. Food is not just about taste, it is also strongly about presentation. You know the feeling when you are looking forward to a meal, and when it arrives it looks and smells fabulous, and you smile and can't wait to taste it. My feeling today was the opposite of this, and one of huge disappointment.
The bread also was not cooked properly, it was soft and just warm, but a panini should be crispy on both sides and hot, with melted cheese in the middle, when cooked in a proper panini machine. It was as if they just put the ingredients in to a raw panini. I am sure that they did not use a proper panini machine for this.
The overall flavour with the mushrooms and tomato was poor and virtually tasteless, due to there being hardly any filling inside the panini. This plus the salad I had last time were both extremely disappointing.
It's such a shame, as the cafe itself is lovely to look at, it has a nice vibe, and some of the pastas/evening meals are very very good. But to be a good cafe/restaurant, it is not enough to just have a few select meals that are good.
Everything has to be good, AND value for money, and until Fiat Caffe realises this and ups its' game, I shall not be returning.
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