Mr Lobster Private Kitchen 龍虾皇私房菜 — Restaurant in Henderson-Massey

Newly opened Chinese restaurant and Yum Cha. There's a lot of potential for success and lots of room for improvement.

We experienced their Yum Cha service.

[Food] The crispy pork and shrimp rice roll was very delicious. It's a must get.

But a lot of their other dishes we tried were trying too hard to be something it's not. For example the Pork and Prawn Sui Mai with XO Sauce had a little dollop of XO Sauce on each Sui Mai. The sauce was extra and did not complement the Sui Mai itself. Or the Fried Turnip Cake, was served with extra mince in the top. The Turnip Cake itself was satisfactory, but the extra mince did not make it special or give it more points. Of course this is our personal taste. Lastly, the Xiao Long Bao did not look fresh and I've never seen them served in an aluminum/tin foil cup.

[Service] The service was incredibly poor, given the fact that it wasn't even busy as you would imagine during the weekend lunch.

Upon arriving, the staff noticed us and made eye contact, but did not approach us, seat us, or acknowledge us. It took a few minutes before we were invited to be seated at a table with no table cloth or cutlery. It took a few more minutes before our table was set. We assumed it might've been only us. But another party came in about 20 minutes later. The front of house staff passed by this party a few times before they were seated.

I would recommend a more attentive maitre d to assist with instructing the staff. Or better delegation of staff roles. Too often I would observe the front of house staff trying to juggle multiple jobs, rather than prioritizing the needs of the customers.

In addition, unlike typical Yum Cha experiences, where the front of house would push dim sum carts around. You would mark your order on a sheet of paper and they would prepare it hot for you. This means the food is hot and fresh. But it takes away from the Yum Cha experience, so I wouldn't formally acknowledge this as a Yum Cha. The layout of the tables would also unlikely to be suitable for a dim sum cart to be pushed around.

[Overall] As I mentioned, there is a lot of potential for success at this restaurant. I hope the team at this restaurant are open to some valuable feedback from multiple customers.

Whilst, this review is only 2 stars, I will still be looking forward to coming back here in the future. I hope by then the restaurant is successful and I will be more than happy to revise my initial review.

In the meantime, please don't miss the opportunity to experience the food at this restaurant, especially the crispy pork and...

EDIT 09/05/23 They somehow managed to stuff up the tea. It had sugar in it. They have lost their way and strayed from all the beautiful traditional flavours and textures of yum cha. What was once a fresh twist on a traditional dish is now a desecration of sugar. Everything has sugar in it. Can't get traditonal menu. Chef is obsessed with sugar and cheese. I ordered SPICY Sichuan chilli pepper chicken and it was bland, zero heat absolutely no numbing sensation, my partner that doesnt like hot spice even said it was bland, and it had sweet salt? Chef is obsessed with sugar. Ordered crispy roast pork- average at best barely crispy and bland, you can get better superior pork from Tai Ping. Chef needs to remeber the flavours and textures we all go to yum cha/dim sum for and honor those dishes by excelling in them not forgetting them to ego. Honestly ruined my birthday. Could not even drink tea. I refused to pay for the Sichuan chicken and they accepted and removed the cost from my bill which was appreciated. Do not come here for excellent traditonal yum cha you wont find it here anymore sadly. I have previously recommended this restaurant many times but wont be doing so anymore.

(Original review 5/5) Went there today 9/5/22 and the Yum Cha was seriously good, we all commented about how delicious the food was and how the quality was superior to other Yum Cha restaurants we have been to. Lunch has the usual Yum Cha menu but also a few dishes we hadn't tried that still had classic dim sum appeal. Everything was delicious and we tried 5x new dishes and liked them all. Have been here before many times but today the food quality had improved so much that I asked if they had a new chef. Apparently the boss was in maybe the chefs were working extra hard 😆 It was a birthday lunch and we ordered loads of food, 11 dishes, tea and and apple juice for 3 greedy adults and 1 hungry child. We were very satisfied with the meal and only spent about $115 for 4 people to try 11 different dishes. That is awesome value for the flavour and quality. I will be back very soon. Honestly...

I am giving this only 3 stars because of parking and the procedure for waiting for your table. I would make it 3.5 if I could. Food is top-notch.

I did not take any photos, but there are plenty showing the kind of food you get; it is very high quality. You can order using QR code on your phone (fastest way) or you can use a laminated card to select options with a marker then flag down a waiter.

The menu appears to have been restricted recently and we could not find a way to order favorites like simple spring rolls or prawn rolls. The only option was chicken and mushroom spring rolls, which is fine for adults, but not kids.

Deep fried squid was perfectly done, crisp and not greasy. We ordered a selection of dishes and all of them were very high quality and delicious.

Mr. Lobster is one of the few places where you can get live crayfish (lobster) and have them prepared in a variety of ways.

It is expensive and my preference is to stick to prawns, but my kids like it, so we generally get a lobster and it is fun picking one out.

Aside from parking, another issue with this restaurant is that if you make a booking, which we always do, you will still end up waiting for your table. That is not a major issue except that they make you wait outside, and when it is winter, blustery, cold and you have small kids, it is not pleasant.

It is especially annoying when you watch people showing up after you (in similar sized parties) and they are shown directly in. Starting times for meals are set, so they are obviously on the same starting time, but somehow get preference.

We were in the 12:30 slot which is the busiest time. If you can handle a brunch (10:30 start) then parking and waiting issues would well be less...