Deadly Bunny & Chubby Penguin: Liu Chinese Restaurant @ Conrad Bangkok

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Liu Chinese Restaurant @ Conrad Bangkok

Cuisine: Chinese (dim sum)

Map: Liu Chinese Restaurant @ Conrad Bangkok

Price: THB650 per person without alcohol (what we paid for)

Visited: 6 October 2013

Food: 4/10

Atmosphere: 5/10

Value for money: 3/10

Services: 5/10

As far as I remember, my latest visit to Liu Chinese Restaurant @ Conrad Bangkok was more than 5 years back. I kind of faintly recall my experience back then. For this time, we gave Liu a visit during Nine Emperor Gods Festival - เทศกาลกินเจ and some of our parties only consumed vegetable during the festival. Liu, without fail, also served vegetable menu during such season.

I have to say that my overall impression with Liu this time was not so great. Service was average but below 5 stars Hotel standard. Food was so-so. Value for money, of course, was not excellent for sure. Anyway, I would presume that this Chinese restaurant is one good place for a family meal. The restaurant is large and comes with various size of tables. There are also many private rooms which can be great for large group with indeed large noise or business talk. The decor is in traditional Chinese theme with wooden furniture as main parts.

Liu Chinese Restaurant @ Conrad Bangkok

Typically, dim sum dishes are parted into fried dishes and steamed dishes. For fried dishes at Liu, they were not impressive. Many dishes were not well fried leaving excess oil holding within the food. The followings are what we had:

deep fried bean curd roll with cheese - ฟองเต้าหู้ม้วนชีสทอด
deep fried prawn dumpling and salad dressing - เกี้ยวกุ้งทอดมายองเนส
deep fried egg custard buns - ซาลาเปาครีมทอด
taro dumpling - เผือกทอดซอสนมสด

The overall impression for fried dim sum at Liu would be around 3/10. I would put it as below expected standard. There have been many occasions that I come across better fried dim sum. For example deep fried egg custard buns were somewhat chewy when it was expected to be crisp outside and soft inside, and the filling was too sweet. Well, we perhaps visited Liu on a wrong day for dim sum.

deep fried bean curd roll with cheese (THB110)

deep fried prawn dumpling and salad dressing (THB110)

deep fried egg custard buns (THB90) / taro dumpling (THB110)

inside of deep fried custard buns

For steamed dim sum, they were better and more enjoyable from my perspective: 5/10 for steamed dim sum. Steamed dumpling range was on average in term of taste. For steamed rice flour rolls, we had the one filled with deep fried dough in which it is usually a nice dish on its own. However, I found that the dough was not crisp to give such joy. Anyway, here are what we had:

steamed rice flour rolls filled with crab stick - ก๋วยเตี๋ยวหลอดปาท่องโก๋
steamed minced pork buns - เซี่ยวหลงเปา
steamed minced shrimp and scallop with wasabi - ขนมจีบกุ้งหอยเชลล์วาซาบิ
X.O. sauce siu mai - ขนมจีบซอสเอ็กซ์โอ

steamed rice flour rolls filled with crab stick (THB130)

here is the square cut of steamed rice flour rolls

steamed minced pork buns (THB110)

steamed minced shrimp and scallop with wasabi (THB90)

X.O. sauce siu mai (THB110)

Dessert may be what we enjoyed the most at Liu, though they are not the best. Coconut ice-cream in young coconut (5/10), for example, creamy and not overly sweet. While chilled sago and pomelo in mango cream (5/10) was as well pleasant. Refreshing with balance between sour from pomelo and sweetness from mango. Perhaps this is the dish I, personally, like the most here at Liu.

With all of these dishes, I could say that if this was not just a wrong day for Liu, I would definitely not be returning to this Chinese place in the 5 stars hotel unless there is a big improvement.