Yugen Dining — Restaurant in Melbourne

I came to Yugen tonight to celebrate my birthday. Oh boy was such a good meal.

We started off with the red snapper, which was super fresh. Super tasty, and I love that it had a little bit of jamon on top which gave it that extra kick of saltiness from the curing which was chefs kiss.

Next we got the prawn toast which everyone seemed to be ordering and usually I get this at Yumcha and it’s OK but Yugen’s variation of the prawn toast is pretty good. I love that. They used a Chinese fried dough stick as the toast, very innovative. But the real winner on this dish was definitely the sauce in the middle. Yum with a bit of spice

Next, we got the smoked eel Chawanmushi, it’s interesting because the steamed egg was so shallow and I haven’t seen that before. It’s topped with fried chicken skin and smoked eel, the smoky flavor definitely comes out a lot when you eat it, it’s a very fragrant delicate dish

The least favorite of the starters would probably be the prawn and black truffle dumplings. I think they were quite heavily reliant on the truffle flavor and that feature of the truffle, it wasn’t really doing much, if anything, it was a bit more on the bland side, I love that they had fresh truffle on top, but at the end of the day, it wasn’t an amazing dumpling. It was a little bit underwhelming.

Next, we have the gochujang fried chicken thighs. This dish was so delicious. I love the sweet, spicy, the crispy and the juiciness of the chicken. It was just the perfect dish. The kimchi and potato noodle it was served with wasn’t too pleasant. I think it can go without it or you need to ferment your kimchi a little bit more it honestly just tasted like dishwater

I heard mixed reviews about the fried eggplant, but we still tried it. And I loved it. I love the crisp edge of the eggplant the softness inside. And the sauce that it was served with was just perfect. I think I’m just a sucker for sweet yet slightly spicy sauces

We also got the chargrilled octopus that was really delicious. Slight smoky char grill flavor, which I really liked. The octopus was cooked really really well. And the sauce that it was served on complemented the octopus really well.

Lastly, for dessert, we ordered the crispy kueh sago. We weren’t to sure what to expect with this dish - the menu had said there would be red bean, there would be sago, grapefruit, and cream cheese. So we gave it a shot. It came out like a fried banana fritter with red bean inside the sego was the fried part which surrounded the red bean. I was a little bit confused with this – because the grapefruit didn’t go well. The sago didn’t go well with the red bean the cream cheese kind of just sat there. I think it was a very confused dessert.

But then we also ordered the birthday cake that was a pre-order. That was delicious. It had notes of Matcha ice cream as well as strawberries honestly so much better than the...

We travelled interstate to experience this restaurant on our first night out in Melbourne, a Saturday night. Booked for 8:30, we did arrive slightly later but called while on our way - however they did not find the booking and admitted they thought we had already arrived, realising they had given our table to someone else.

When we arrived, we were sat down at a 3 seated, huge round table next to a wall/pilon. With other more suitable seats empty beside us, we sat there for a short while before requesting a different seat, to which they happily obliged.

We sat at another large round table, but in a corner position, with a view of the restuarant. We then ordered the 6 course “Chef’s Selection” at $180pp, without pairing (alcohol).

The food started to arrive and was deliciously satisfying, quite amazing. We ate 4 courses, enjoying every dish thoroughly.. It was at this point we sat chatting and waiting for the next course.

The staff were around us, keeping a distant eye on us, but not engaging. 40 minutes had passed after our 4th course, and everyone seated around us had by this time left the restaurant. I thought we had finished, due to what looked like the closing of the restaurant, but my partner insisted we had more courses that were supposed to come.

I then noticed a waiter walking towards us with two dessert bowls, to which, our serving waitress abruptly stopped her, checking the food and checking the computer. She then sent her back with the desserts.

It was at this time we were growing extremely impatient, our food had settled and our appetites had diminished. Another 5 minutes later the waitress finally came to our table and asked if we had received our 5th meal, to which we replied “not yet”.

10 or so minutes later we were bombarded with not only our 5th course, but 4 extra courses of food to make up for the wait.

Overwhelmed with the amount of food, and knowing how much we wanted to try it, we found ourselves severely overeating, especially when they offered a “fried rice” as an extra course after the steak, which just didn’t go down well at all.

With three dessert courses to eat, beautifully presented, I forced down the food.. but just felt tired, frustrated, unhealthfully over-filled, and severely disappointed by the experience.

No free drinks were offered, no discount. The entire night cost us $424, and I must say, while the food was delicious, the experience...

Underwhelming. Sadly , expectations were high! We didn’t get our drink orders taken for at least 20 minutes after arriving.

The food came quickly - that was great but absolutely nothing stood out. Surprisingly the best tasting dish of them all was the eggplant.

The sticky lamb ribs were also pretty good — but again, nothing stand out about them.

Vegetarian Fried rice portion was ridiculously small for the price, the salad that was advertised as crispy tofu and nashi pear .. one question - where was the tofu? Hardly counts when all you’ve done is sprinkle less than a quarter of a handful of crumbled tofu pieces throughout.

Every other table around us also got taken through the menu & were quite well looked after. We didn’t get that experience at all. We had to ask the waiter to take our drink order and because we waited so long, we ordered food at the same time. We were not checked in on at all & it was pretty frustrating to see other patrons be given a walk through of the menu.

One thing to note , we don’t eat seafood so we can’t speak on the taste / quality of the dishes. Perhaps Yugen are much better at seafood than the other types of dishes provided.

The drinks we had were okay. Nothing to remember.

Overall , the venue was beautiful , but it’s a shame to see that aesthetic matters more than quality of both food and service. It’s definitely something that is becoming increasingly popular in the fine dining industry now days.

Also - the couple next to us ordered dessert after their meal. Then 10 minutes later, the waitress came back and told them they actually had to leave because the next booking had arrived. I understand there is a time frame for seatings but why would you take their desert order then? It’s incredibly embarrassing and rude - I felt really awkward for them and I could tell they were pretty shocked and confused by this too.

I would really suggest the team behind Yugen Dining revisit their offerings and training to provide the service and experience their customers are paying a lot of money for

— Update : The venue manager called me this afternoon & was genuinely apologetic for my partner and I’s experience. It has gone a long way - it’s nice to see venue management care about their reviews and try to act on them. I’m looking forward to trying Yugen again next time, thank you for...