YUM CHA (Central) — Restaurant in Hong Kong Island

The first time we went there, we ordered what were marked could be done vegetarian. Beetroot fried rice, rice noodles and Singapore noodles. My little minion (the child) made sure he added 'no eggs' to the order after I confirmed it would be free of any chicken stock, fish sauce, blah blah blah. But I couldn't recollect for sure if I mentioned 'no eggs' or not, so didn't want to make a fuss when all of it arrived with eggs.

The chive pancakes was all I ate, played with the rest a little before disappointedly wrapping up the meal there.

Towards the end, it did occur to me that we did mention 'no eggs' but I guess it was a bit too late or I felt awkward, so I told the manager towards the end explaining the situation exactly while paying the cheque. And I mentioned to the host as we were returning of it. Not sure if it wasn't in their capacity or not to do anything about it or not, but I didn't want to fuss about it then.

Top it with the fact that our server confidently placed pork buns on our table saying it was vegetarian when I could tell they weren't - it clearly said so on the menu!!!

I recounted the situation, exactly as it was, on the email to them and they were very gracious in responding. I wasn't expecting much, but they apologized for the situation and offered to pay a gift certificate of about half the amount we spent there and offered to make a reservation for me to make sure it'd all be good the next time around.

I happily went there again, for a weekday lunch sans the husband and the child and ordered completely different things to eat.

These included the bomb truffle dumplings, spicy eggplant (cold) and tofu (cold). And a raspberry bellini. And can I say I enjoyed my lunch. You must try all these things.

The way those delicate slices of tofu were laid, that peppery sauce of the tender eggplants and the truffle-y deliciously thin dumplings, plump with the stuffing inside.

Everything was great. The server was the same as last time and I was all attentive and made sure I checked with someone else (the host) to make sure what I was ordering was vegan. The manager on duty was kind enough to stop by, bring me his card and introduce himself.

They added tea to the charge, which I confirmed if was a default, irrespective of whether we order it or not and I was told it was an accident but they did amend it on the card quickly.

Lots of back and forth but this to me was hospitality done right. And the food was just superb. I'd highly recommend.

More photos and details on my website -...

Food was bad and the service was worse. We ordered set menu for 4 people. We were served all the food in a bizzare random order. Started from one dish from main course, then one dish from appetizer, and so on. We got the spring rolls almost at the end! Server kept asking us to empty the plate of the dish so they could clear it. Why cant they let us eat according to our pace and will? The restaurant was almost empty and we were nowehere near closing time. When we took a while, they just took the whole plate of food away without asking and did not respond when we called after them.

This was the last day of our 11 day trip to the city. Cultural differences with food are common and completely understandable. But we have never come accross this kind of behavior. We can understand time crunch of rush hours, but saw nothing to vouch for it. Even if we assume that the only two other occupied tables had gotten the staff of this huge restaurant in a rush, polite explanations from the staff could have gone a long way.

Seemed like they didn't want to make an effort and were just throwing food at us.

TLDR: Food is bad and service...

the staff asked us if we wanted water (after we had passed to her our order sheet, we only wanted 2 items off the food menu and on the drinks menu it did not state tap water anywhere and only stated the price of mineral & sparkling water so we assumed tap water is free like every normal restaurant) and did not mention to us that water would incur the same charge as tea which is hkd $16 (not inclusive of the 10% service charge yet) which is sgd $3 per glass which is extremely unreasonable and when we asked if we could get a refund as we were not told the staff shut us down.

as an asian who is an avid eater of dim sum, i would say Yum Cha’s food is mediocre. the only special element of the dim sum is the ‘cute’ & ‘instagrammable’- ness of it so if you are in Hong Kong looking to eat actual good dim sum, i would recommend skipping Yum Cha as it is EXTREMELY overpriced (one rack of 包 is hkd $49 which is sgd $8.50 before...