Mings is a popular restaurant amongst most of our
group. Its wide ranging
Chinese-Malaysian menu includes tasty Malaysian curries, interesting vegetarian
dishes (particularly tofu and eggplant), nice seafood and good Hawker style
noodles (including Kim’s favourite Char Kway Teow). We have had some great meals there but oddly
never when Megan is there - we call it the “Megan curse”. Despite this (and always willing to tempt
fate), we chose Mings to welcome Megan back from her holiday.
It didn’t start well. Unusually (for Mings), the service was
slow and surly but our night started to pick up when entrée arrived - one of
our favourites (crispy duck in pancakes).
The duck is deep fried and then served (Peking duck style) in pancakes
with hoisin sauce, green spring onions and cucumber. Soooo yummy… this dish is
always a winner!!
For the main dishes, we ordered barramundi served 2 ways,
fillet steak with samboy sauce cooked with Thai basil, vegetable hot pot with
tofu (Nyonya style), rock salt eggplant with mushroom and Gulai Ayam (boneless
chicken cooked with red curry). There
was more than enough food for 5 of us especially as the barramundi really
counted as 2 dishes.
The barramundi dish cooked 2 ways looks fabulous and is a
fantastic banquet dish. Half the barramundi was coated in water chestnut flour
and then deep fried (on the bone). The
deep fried fish was moist and tasty and the flour crust added a nice crispy
element to the dish. However the serving sauce was disappointing. Described as a “Schezuan chilli sauce”, it
was almost entirely a (bottled) sweet chilli sauce with a couple of black beans
thrown in – too sweet and no depth of flavour.
The other half of the fish was cooked as a stir fry with a garlic,
ginger sauce and lots of snowpeas (already a winner for Jim). This part of the dish was quite tasty and
nicely contrasted with the other (deep fried) element of the dish.
The fillet steak with samboy sauce cooked with thai basil
was very nice. The meat was extremely
tender presumably treated with bicarb soda to get that fantastic melt in mouth
texture of many Chinese dishes. We
weren’t sure what the “samboy sauce” actually was – it was quite sweet with a
hint of ginger and perhaps a touch of sour.
The addition of Thai basil seemed unusual but it added a nice fresh
element and worked reasonably well with the dish.
We ordered the vegetable hot pot having seen it served at a
neighbouring table. Unfortunately our version didn’t look anywhere near as nice
(always the way…something about the grass being greener…). While there was plenty of deep fried tofu in
our dish to soak up the sauce, there weren’t a lot of other vegetables to add
texture, colour or flavour. The very
mild coconut sauce was also quite boring when it should have been a highlight
of the complex Nyonya style of cooking.
Our bad luck with vegetable dishes continued with rock salt
eggplant with mushroom dish. This was simply battered eggplant (or mushroom)
slices, deep fried and then sprinkled with a salt/chilli mixture. While the dish was OK, the batter was very
heavy and did nothing for either vegetable.
Our final dish was the Gulai Ayam (boneless chicken cooked
with red curry). We were expecting a rich red curry but it was more yellow in
colour. Tastewise, the meat was very tender but there was a strong curry powder
flavour which needed to be better integrated into the sauce. There were also far too many potatoes in the
curry which not only detracted from the flavour but also made the sauce look
cloudy and “starchy”.
Overall, the meal was OK but we have had much better meals
there which made this one seem a little disappointing. We also ended the night
the same as we started (with surly service).
Without being asked for, the bill came as soon as we finished our mains
and dessert was never offered. It was only
8:45pm and we felt as if we were being kicked out of the
restaurant…..ah, they were obviously worried about the “Megan curse”!
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