Hawker Chan SM Baguio — Restaurant in Baguio

Staff member greeting by the entrance was friendly and convinced me to eat as I was walking by yesterday.(It was lunchtime & was choosing places at the time). Had high hopes based on the "Michelin Star" rating on their sign & haven't tried this place before. It's FALSE ADVERTISING since the Michelin Star rating has been removed & I can see why. Food presentation was unappetizing when it arrived, and everything is overpriced. "Roasted Duck" (P338) was served COLD and it looks like it was just boiled instead of being roasted based on how watery the meat tasted (not juicy, it was watery)- extremely bland taste. Real roasted duck doesn't taste this bland. To me, it seemed that it was only boiled/steamed & just deep fried before serving to make the skin crispy & look roasted. That, or I was probably served unsold dishes made from the previous day that was kept in the fridge & reheated. Duck meat serving is way too small for the price & they compensated by adding 1 boiled chicken egg with the dish which I ate, since the duck meat was insufficient to satisfy my hunger. Size of duck served is half size smaller than a regular inasal-sized chicken. Rice was cold & didn't eat it, from sight & smell alone I know that the rice is not premium, not even restaurant standard. Crackling was mediocre as well and even Chow King serves better cracklings than this. The sauce/dipping condiments- tried both and both "chili vinegar"& "pickle" were underwhelmingly watered o down. Neither tasted sour, hot, or anything special, really. In fact I don't understand why they have them since they both didn't help enhance the dishes I ordered. Even worse was the the ala carte fried pork (P248) was MOSTLY pure cuts of PORK FAT, very salty & laden in spices. 80% of the dish was breaded pork fat which was really white & soft inside & outside was a breaded coating. Unlike chicharon where it is crispy throughout, this had a thin layer of crispy outside & thick white pork fat inside (it's like pork adobo fatty cut on the inside but also fried outside). Inedible. I ended up only eating 2 small pieces of meat after searching which wasn't deep fried fat. I tried dipping the pork in the duck sauce to remove some of the saltiness (the duck sauce taste a little sweet like Mang Tomas sauce only darker), but the pork was really too salty that it barely helped at all. I couldn't eat most of what was served and I feel ripped off. This was the first & last time I'm eating there. Pic attached is what I couldn't eat. Couldn't even force myself to. It was a total waste of my time and money & really felt cheated. had to find another resto to satisfy my hunger and to forget the taste of the fried pork fat. Total spend was P626 (drink I ordered was a small bottled water which cost P40). Maybe other dishes in their menu are better but I would never recommend the 2 that I got, save your money and from being...

This branch just opened about a week or 2 ago so minor snafus can be expected while they fine tune operations. HOWEVER, even taking that into consideration, I was pretty disappointed with my first experience.

Food was ok. Well, what arrived of my order that is. The female wait staff who took my order didn't add dumplings, which was fine since I reordered from a different server. BUT after finishing my beef noodle soup and waiting for 10 or so minutes I was told dumplings were not available. So I changed my order to buchi and waited, then waited some more. Followed up my order from the server who took my order, then another server and finally the manager. Turns out my order was not placed and was told I had to wait some more if I still wanted them. After waiting about 30 minutes more or less I lost all appetite for them.

I will try again after the holidays. Hopefully by then operations will be running more smoothly.

The saving grace was that the staff were attentive and kind, but unforunately those don't fill up a hungry tummy.

Edit: January 28, 2023

Went back to eat with my brother. Finally got to eat all the food I ordered. Satisfied with both the food...

We bought 2 orders from this branch, particularly Hainanese Chicken Tray B and Beef Brisket.

Firstly, the Beef Brisket Combo was so disappointing. The wonton soup and the dried noodles that came with it tasted weird. The wonton left a bad taste of pork in my mouth. Malalasahan yung lansa ng pork. Yung beef brisket naman is parang stew. Taste was subpar talaga and super konti ng serving. Unlike what was advertised in their photos.

Secondly, the Hainanese Chicken Tray B was okay. But was the price worth it? No. I sincerely enjoyed the rice and the chicken but the laksa soup that came with it? HARD NO.

Thirdly, our experience with the staff wasn’t great as well. When we were paying our bill our change and receipt was taking soooo long to arrive. I am not sure what was happening for the delay, but we had to follow up one of their staff and they told us to claim at the counter. After going to the counter, our bill wasn’t even processed. And it feels like both manager and the person working at the counter were not pleased that we were asking for our receipt and change. Did not even receive an apology. 😕

Mind you guys, they were not...