Kuuk — Restaurant in Mérida

During my last night in Merida, I dined at Kuuk. The expectations were set high: everyone in town raves about this being the best restaurant in the city. “A gastronomic experience”, I was told. Having dined in first class establishments around the world, I had been looking forward to dining here. I tried to make reservations for an entire week, however, the restaurant was always booked. I had a difficult time reaching the restaurant via telephone as well. I finally caved and made a reservation on open table the same day.

Upon arriving at the restaurant, my dining partner and I were greeted by a very kind and welcoming hostess. The foyer’s grandeur was reminiscent of old colonial charm. She promptly seated us in a dining room that was far from capacity. The dining room was ill lit and and poorly decorated with what seemed like used office furniture. Our table was wonky and had to be adjusted. The fabric napkins seemed like they had been used for extended periods of time and needed to be replaced.

Upon being seated, we were offered our choice of water. Since they did not have the water I requested, the server brought an alternative without consulting. We opted to start with cocktails. I had a gin cocktail with lemongrass and my companion had a drink especially made upon request. The cocktails were delightful.

We were offered the menu, which consisted of a tasting menu and an a la carte menu. We opted for the a la carte and tried several things. We had originally planned on ordering six dishes. Upon our server’s suggestion, we ordered four dishes. Due to the low price point, we were expecting the portions to be small. We selected the esquites, castacan, fried octopus, and cenote fish.

Bread service was solid: house made sourdough with Chaya butter topped with truffle oil. The first two courses arrived and we were surprised by the generous portion sizes. The esquites came out along with the castacan, accompanied by a trio of salsas to add spice to your liking. The castacan was the highlight of the first round. Traditional Yucatán style pork belly, in a delightful and tart, yet balanced vinaigrette with red onions, cherry tomatoes and dotted with avocado sauce.

At this point, our cocktail glasses were empty. They were taken from our table and we were not offered any more beverages. Our second set of dishes arrived. The cenote fish was plated nicely and finished table-side with a green Chaya based broth. The fish was delicately steamed yet lacked distinctive flavor profiles. It was served simultaneously with the fried octopus. The octopus was deep fried, however, it was perfectly balanced by the vinaigrette it was doused in.

When our server finally decided to grace us with his presence after our meal, he came back to offer dessert. We had been wanting more beverages for a while, however, we decided to forgo due to his surly and condescending attitude the entire evening. For the duration of our meal, we were mostly catered to by the server’s assistants, who were quite gracious. We opted out of dessert for the same reasons.

My takeaway from our dining experience at Kuuk was just that. It was an experience, however, I don’t think I would return or recommend to my acquaintances. I had better service and comparable food at many different establishments around town. I kindly suggest further training the particular staff member who assisted us so they can offer a more memorable...

From other reviews we were really looking forward to lunch at Kuuk. The building is pretty non-descript from the outside but is decorated and furnished to a reasonably high standard inside. We ordered the 12 course tasting menu. Unfortunately, for the price, we were left very disappointed. The pricing point is around what you might pay for a tasting menu at a 2 Michelin star restaurant in a major city like London but the quality and innovation wasn’t close to that standard. We were no experts to opine on whether the menu genuinely reflected the supposed Mayan heritage but what we can say is that we found most of the courses pretty bland and fairly basic. The exception was the ‘seafood course’ which is 3 of the ‘12 courses’ brought out at the same time - shrimp, octopus and seafood tostada. The octopus won from a presentation point of view but the seafood tostada was our favourite taste-wise. However all the other courses were pretty much a let down. The 4 desert courses were ‘ok’ but the final ‘course’ was merely 3 sweets which you would typically just get along with the bill at most high end restaurants. And the other 3 deserts were nothing more than you would be able to get at a fraction of the price at one of the decent restaurants in the Merida old town. So we thought referring to it as a 12 course menu was quite misleading and this certainly wouldn’t be accepted as a 12 course menu in the Michelin guide.

Given what you can get in Mexico (and most other countries) for 2,700 MXN per person, we would recommend saving your money and trying somewhere else. This menu should be no more than 50% of that price based on our experience and we can’t quite understand why the restaurant has as good...

So disappointing. This place has the prices of a high-end establishment but unfortunately neither the food or the service to match it. It almost brings tears to my eyes to think that we could have eaten five times at e.g. Apoala for the 6,000 pesos we paid for two people..

The food at Ku’uk is okayish and focuses on local cuisine, which was interesting. We had the tasting menu where nothing was really bad and nothing blew our minds. However, a few starters were cold in the center like they just came out of the fridge which is such an easy thing to avoid... The wine pairing was very disappointing and consisted of a beer, three wines (rosé, white and red) from the same winery (Casa Meduro) and a dessert wine from France. Seem awfully coincidental that Meduro’s three 2019 wines just incidentally happened to pair well with the food and unfortunately it didn’t really turn out to be the case either (a light rosé to go along with a very overpowering black sauce??).

The service was a let down. The welcome indifferent. No tablecloth (fair enough) and paper napkins (why?). Presentation of food was rushed. The real let-down was the wine service. We kept being served our pairings way too early or after we had eaten half the dish they were supposed to go along with. The red wine was served ice cold which is just unforgivable - how can a place with these prices make so simple mistakes..? The waiters also kept forgetting to refill water as well as kept forgetting whether we preferred still or sparkling (asked three times)..

What this place has going for it is the mansion thy the restaurant is located in, which was...