Kee Lung

I haven’t had Taiwanese food for a long time, and when the menu promised “Taiwanese night market”, I was very excited.

Food

We ordered just Taiwanese specials. I was excited to see so many different varieties of soya drinks on the menu. We ordered the Hot soya milk (£2.30), which came in a bowl with a bowl of sugar – great touch as you can adjust the sweetness itself. I didn’t bother with the sugar and was pleased with the taste. Slokky had the Salted soya milk (£2.30), which you don’t see on many menus, but this just turned out to be salted soya milk…so all our excitements were over nothing.

I was hankering after the soya-marinated Taiwanese little eats, but unfortunately could not eat any of the innards anymore, so I tried the only dish that I could eat, the Beancurd (£2). It was a bit disappointing. The soya sauce was actually sweet, and the tofu was served warm. The other street eat of Mixed Meat Balls (£3.80) was also disappointing I think. The sauce was nice, sweet and filled with sesame, but I felt that it didn’t go with all the different varieties of meat balls. It paired well with the more salty and pungent ones, but not the sweeter varieties.

Fortunately, the next two dishes show promise, the Pig’s Trotters (£8) were salty, soaked in the sauce, and was melt in the mouth, with glutinous bits of skin and a sweet and salty sauce making it very satisfactory. Tinan Pork Noodle Soup with Prawns (£4.30) only came with one prawn, but delivered a big flavour hit. The noodles were nice and chewy, with beautifully marinated pork mince and yummy soup.

We were full by this point, but couldn’t resist trying the interesting sounding Crystal Balls (£2.60) – which was 6 balls of custard, red bean, yellow bean, but with a chocolate sauce which I felt didn’t suit. The balls themselves, the filling was nice, the pastry was nice, but looked better than they tasted.

Rating - 6

Atmosphere

It is a pretty new restaurant, so they have gone for the new look of dark lighting and dark brown wood – funky white bowls that is prettier rather than functional. They play 60s tune and have pictures of Elvis and the Rat Pack on the wall…strange, but the music is more pleasant than if they play soppy Chinese songs from the 90s.

Rating - 1.5

Service

They were so rude!! Things started off quite well actually with our menus delivered promptly and then we were left to make our choices. As soon as we put our pens down they put all the orders in. They were smart enough not to deliver desserts until we had finished our mains. The waiter was very polite as well and said thank you after delivering every dish. And now the bad points, even though we arrived at 3pm and the restaurant was virtually empty, but we felt like we were really rushed. As soon as we had cleared a plate, and sometimes before, they would take our dishes away. I was still finishing my food, but they had already removed my bone plate and my chopstick rest. I felt like I had to hold on tight to my soya milk so they don’t take it away, but they took away the sugar that was supposed to go with the milk.

Rating - 2

C-factor

It WAS £28.80 including service charge, but Slokky decided to give them another £2 for no reason, because the machine asked if you wanted to leave a tip. I guess they were sneaky to ask for a tip after they put on a mandatory service charge, but I think if you are dumb enough to fall for it, you deserve to be charged extra.

Rating - 0

Brownie Points - 9.5

Info

6-7 Lisle Street
London
WC2H 7BG
Phone +44 (0) 20 7734 8128