Taman Sari Brasserie @ Hotel Istana Kuala Lumpur

Friday, January 02, 2015 0 Comments A+ a-


Happy New Year!! Wishes to all my readers and friends, welcoming the year 2015, I wish all healthy and  enjoying life as much as I do. To begin the celebration of long holiday, my dad in law give me as task to find a restaurant to dine in with my family in a nice dining environment * hint* buffet type of hotel restaurant. It was not easy to find a hotel restaurant offering buffet price less than RM 100 during eve of New Year on that day itself. Double priced and over priced!! I have search the website whole day and could not figure out where to dine in and even a high tea is really expensive. The main concern is, not worth paying for that price just because it was a special day / public holiday ..especially New Year Day

Then, I found the deals website offering buffet dinner or weekend high tea at Taman Sari Brasserie @ Hotel Istana for only RM 55 from Groupon. Usual price is RM 110 and the food served is same as walk in customer / hotel guest. The terms in Groupon website stated that this voucher is not applicable for public holiday and eve of public holidays and children at age 5 is charged half price. I try my luck by calling the restaurant to clarify on the terms before purchasing the deal. The staff told me I can use it on 1 Jan 2015 ( public holiday) and kids aged 6 only will be charged half price. That sounds great and quickly I ask my hubby to purchase 7 vouchers altogether. Savings of around 50% value. 

It was a smooth traffic and we can easily find the place, reached within 20 minutes from our house. Hotel Istana is located at Jalan Raja Chulan, along the KL busy city, 5 minutes walk from Pavilion and Bukit Bintang.  Taman Sari Brasserie is located at Lobby Level, East Wing which surround with gardens and outdoor swimming pool. The restaurant offers wide range of local and international cuisines. We can find Malay cuisines, Indian cuisines, Chinese cuisines, Japanese cuisines and etc. This place reminds me of my past working moments nearby this area where I get the chance to dine in here for free for their secretary invitation and the food is good but until at certain moment when I get to feel bored with their usual Local cuisines.
We are greeted with welcome by the staff, placed our seats in the middle and it took them so long to provide me the baby chairs. I expect they will placed two or three baby chairs for me which I already informed them through phone that I will tag along three kids. Another problems there are no kids cutlery it was so difficult to get the staff to provide me with a small spoons. Definitely not child friendly place to be.

Settle with the seats and now I am looking around for their food..while hubby taking some snapshots of the buffet spread.
I told my mum that I will be coming here to try their buffet dinner and my mum warn me to look for their cleanliness ( she has a bad dining experience where she noticed there are many flies on the food displayed.  Let's see..I start my photos with the desserts counter ( nearer to where I was seated). The assorted fruits are beautifully platted and I found my favourite childhood Homemade traditional cold iced cream!! I always had this while waiting for my school van to fetch me from school. Here they have Asam Boi and corn flavour. My girl never see this before and she was so curious.



Malaysia traditional kuih selections

Sweet desserts- not really my cravings..While I was admiring the food with chocolates tagging the year 2015 at the side of the cakes and puddings, I saw the flies are landing on the food!!! Yuks!! That is so true when my mum told me that please be aware of the flies!!!!..I told my hubby to look carefully before picking up the food. Disappointed with their hygiene, I did told one of the staff but they also seems not bother about it...

Chocolate fondant - The kids loves this section of course with sweets and marshmallow, while dipping on with creamy chocolates.Not a good idea to placed the sweets there, the kids are having them rather than looking at the main meal...sigh


Appetizers section









Grilled lamb and salmon


Chinese cuisines





Limited choices on the Japanese cuisines.Obviously not appetizing at all!

Fresh Seafood?? I can't tell you that..My stomach cannot take this cold seafoods

Pasta section

Indian cuisines



They have special pancake which is one of my favourite tonight


I was being let down by the restaurant again. They told me there will be BBQ seafood for buffet dinner but it turns out to be the simple local tandoori chicken and some spicy Indian cuisines outside the restaurant walkway. Angry and frustrated..The food is not attractive at all with chicken rice, tandoori chicken, lamb and beef which are almost 70% of the food served are spicy. I am expecting BBQ grilled with wide selection of prawn, squids, fish, crabs....and I told my family members the menu for tonight is BBQ Seafood..!!!!!











I am so upset with the food here. Quality drops and most of the food is awful!. The platter of fruits is tasteless, the chicken rice really tastes bad, the chicken tandoori texture is too dry and the Japanese sushi is not fresh. The pasta is overcooked and the cakes is overly sweet. The only food I enjoy is the pancake and vegetables soup.











Taman Sari Brasserie
Hotel Istana Kuala Lumpur City Centre

73 Jalan Raja Chulan
Kuala Lumpur, 50200
Malaysia


* Parking rate is RM 20 - I got a shocked! Dining in without any flat rate privilege. Puzzled...

Phone Number: +603-2141-9988
Email: general@hotelistana.com.my



Groupon Link : http://www.groupon.my/deals/klang/taman-sari-brasserie-1-3/719338163

Website : http://www.hotelistana.com.my/dining/