Pappa Rich

My buddy and I are going on our usual Monday lunch date, and since he was off on Mondays this month, we also decided to catch a movie too. So of course we decided to eat within the vicinity and tried some place new, which is Pappa Rich.

Location: Gadong area, across The Mall

Setting: Very classy and very beautifully set up. A lot of effort has been put into this. It makes for a very nice classy restaurant. Feels almost like A.J.D. Wetherspoon Pub in London

Le menu, which includes the self-order sheet

My Milo Dinosaur (while he ordered the standard Coke)

My buddy's fish and chips

My chicken rice

To be honest, the food wasn't really that impressive. For starters, the sauce tasted sweet, and the black soy sauce they used for my condiments are actually thick sweet soy sauce, which totally contradicts the fact that chicken rice isn't supposed to be sweet at all. Even the soup itself is sweet! My god, what is this? Do they have like overstocked sugar or something? And the chicken was kinda slightly dry. The only thing that really compensated my taste buds was the bean sprouts.

My buddy's food wasn't that too impressive either. The fish wasn't exactly fresh, and it was cooked in a rather bland way, the chips were tough and old and who in the world serves fried rice and sunny-side up eggs with fish and chips? Are they trying to create some sort of fusion? American fried rice with fish and chips kind of dealio? I'm all about fusion but this is just too weird, even for my tastes.

And the price is just too much. I'm actually paying $6.50 (or was it $7.00?) for a crappy chicken rice, and don't even get me started on the price my buddy had to pay for his second-rate fish and chips. It's almost like we're paying for the scenery, not the food. Like the atmosphere and the setting of the restaurant is compensating for the crappy food.

If only they spent that money on the food rather than the decors...

Overall, it's OK if you want to try it just once. But just once is good enough for me. If you're not picky about your food and just want to enjoy a nice, relaxing London-ish setting, by all means.

Overall rating: 4.5/10