I advised her to pick Overseas because it is more traditional rather than the more upmarket ambience of Oriental Pavilion (owned by former boss of original Tai Thong and some partners, if not mistaken) and hopefully, charges would be more reasonable.
There were only 8 of us, and it was decided at the last minute, without any booking. Our guests arrived earlier and it was full, with a small wedding reception as well. My nephew joked that he did not know it was a wedding dinner, or shall we give angpows and join them instead? By the way, I have heard of a friend who actually went to the wrong section of 2 wedding dinners in a restaurant, after giving his angpow to the wrong host! Well, he continued with dinner at the wrong section, otherwise, he had to give another one to be at the right place. The problem arose because he knew some of the guests in the wrong section too.
Anyway, the captain or hostess must have been well trained, as he or she asked them to wait for a while and was given a table.
Being unfamiliar with the restaurant, the usual thing was to ask the captain to recommend. My wife decided what to include and what to leave out. Actually, being allergic to prawns, it was ironic that she declined the roast items (suckling pig, roast pork and roast duck) and opted for prawns and a few other
dishes. I distinctly heard the captain said, the prawns are of medium size. My wife suggested 'ching chiing' (just to differentiate the different pronunciation) or steamed and he suggested 'chiu phai' sauce or Restaurant's special sauce (marmite to me) which with the benefit of hindsight, meant the prawns were not really swimming as they had later claimed to be.
It was quite a disappointment when the dishes came because of the small portions, though seemed adequate for 8 adults. They lacked the 'tai thei' or generous size of big portions which we are used to in Ipoh. At Tuck Kee recently where Cheng gave a dinner to a small group of my in-laws, we had added portions of cod fish and another item and the bill came to only Rm300!
At the cashier's counter, my daughter went to pay after a cursory glance at the bottom amount, without checking. When we got back, I got a shock over the item 'prawns' – Rm180.00! As the rest of the items were small portions, they were between Rm20 and Rm30 each, with the smallish 'pak chong' fish at only Rm33.80. The price for prawns stood out like a sore thumb! As I have mentioned to the manager, it was not a case of us concentrating on a plate of big prawns, but smallish ones! I reason to myself: we got some 8-10 med-sized prawns for Rm180.00 which worked out to an average of more than Rm20 each or Rm18! After peeling, the cooked prawns were the size of my thumb! Of course, we cannot compare with what we are used to in Perak, but as I have mentioned earlier, the place isn't grand and I wasn't expecting such pricing. I have heard of company power lunches for 4 at over Rm1,000 before, so it is difficult to compare with different restaurants.
Anyway, I called up the next day to speak to the same cashier who then directed me to her manager. He said he would call me back after checking with the cooks. Well, he said the cook confirmed that the prawns were at least 1 kg in weight and their price is Rm180 per kg! He apologized for the fact that the captain should have mentioned the price when we were ordering, a point which I did not expect, especially in front of guests. But the moral of the story is that we should make sure to ask for the price per kg when ordering, otherwise we have only ourselves to blame.
Personally, before this, I have already made up my mind about not ordering crabs or prawns even in mamak shops in KL or PJ restaurants if I can help it, because we come from a place with abundant sources of seafood. As I said, it was ironic that my wife who is allergic to prawns was the one who chose it!
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