NOT a food blog
Banquet, Bangsar Village II
2Jul2007 Filed under: Food Type: Misc Western, Food Type: Mishmash Malaysian, Location: Bangsar, LOCATION: KUALA LUMPUR Author: Lyrical Lemongrass
If you have been to Café Café, you will know that its interior is dark and opulent and it is every photographer’s nightmare. Banquet, its sister restaurant, which just opened at Bangsar Village II, is what light is to darkness. The restaurant is decidedly feminine with chandeliers, wicker chairs, wrought iron table stands and flowers everywhere.
The smoking section, located in an enclosed space, is filled with mirrors giving the illusion of space. The non-smoking section is bathed in warm light and is located in the centre court section of the shopping mall. Both are pretty, and the main theme of white furnishings is carried through the two sections.
The menu includes both local as well as western cuisine with prices generally in the RM20 – RM30 range. For starters, we ordered the sweet corn and shrimp fritters (RM14/US$4) which was served with a rather plain, somewhat commercialised, chilli sauce.
I loved the fritters which was fried to a nice crisp with distinct pieces of corn and shrimps. Very tasty and it didn’t leave me with the feeling that I was eating just plain flour.
I enjoyed the baked butter fish (RM25/US$7) which was served with a lovely sweet and tangy honey mustard sauce. I especially loved the sauce’s grainy texture. The salad was pretty ordinary and it’s something that you either love or hate. I felt that the boiled chickpeas would have done better in a rolled up page off the telephone directory rather than in my salad.
The lamb shank (RM38/US$11) was nice and tender. It’s hard to go wrong with an order like this. The lamb shank was served with the same side dish of chickpeas and potato salad.
The seafood spaghetti (RM28/US$8) was served with a generous portion of prawns, but sadly, the prawns were not very fresh.
The dessert menu was rather similar to that found in Café Café. We tried the chocolate tart (RM9/US$2.60) which was very gelatinous in texture and really nothing to shout about.
Also check out:
Banquet
1F-28, Bangsar Village II
2 Jalan Telawi Satu
Bangsar Baru
59100 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 03-2282 3228
23 Responses to “Banquet, Bangsar Village II”
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Food, for me, is a means to an end and not an end in itself.
Food, for me, represents the love of family, the fellowship of friends, and the community and communality it brings.
Precious Pea
July 2nd, 2007 at 10:03 pm
Wow…seems like a perfect place for a romantic dinner. Butterfish at RM25 is a steal!
MeiyeN
July 2nd, 2007 at 11:48 pm
oh god, feel like having da butter fish right now! sooooo yummy!
WokandSpoon
July 2nd, 2007 at 11:58 pm
I’m drooling at the sight of those fritters and the butterfish! mmmm, fish! I still haven’t found a fish shop near me 🙁
team BSG
July 3rd, 2007 at 12:45 am
you really cannot go on like this, with those floating chandeliers, flowery lightings , fine opulence and smokeless smoked buttery fillets , warm enticing aromas , rustic iron tables etc etc. Isn’t it time you allow the maybe power dressed but definitely less endowed (now presumably surounding you in flavorless plastic fittings/cold hardwares trapped in overblown centralised cold systems) to count beans fairly n truly those ssaps ias etc so that v may not be deprived of even more sensuous alluring whiffs everytime and alltime from dear u ? ( sorry got carried away again…as usual )
"Joe" who is constantly craving
July 3rd, 2007 at 1:07 am
wait a sec..i saw 2 girls including u..but theres 3 mains..!! haha i half expected my picture will come up somewhere.. i went again on saturday..hopefully review coming soon lar..
Henry Yeo
July 3rd, 2007 at 1:11 am
got the menu from Iketeru?
Lyrical Lemongrass
July 3rd, 2007 at 2:37 am
precious pea: Not sure if it is romantic enough coz it’s really bright. hehe. Yeah, the butterfish is cheap.
meiyen: thanks for the recommendation. 🙂
wokandspoon: the fritters were really yummy. And the fish….!! aaah!! Where do you live? How come got no fish shop wan?
team bsg: hmm. I’ll get back to you…..
nipplejoe: can’t pimp you too much, rite? Nanti everyone recognise u on the road, then how? And the third person came after you left. 😛
henry: yes, thanks. Am analysing it now. 🙂 You should put an open invite on your blog, dude.
wmw
July 3rd, 2007 at 7:12 am
Ahhh….nice nice….all these new places!
boo_licious
July 3rd, 2007 at 8:02 am
How was the service? Better I hope with time. The butter fish looks good. Must give it a try soon. Think I should ask if I can omit the chickpeas or replace it with more salad.
cc
July 3rd, 2007 at 9:43 am
Oh, I love the deco. I would go there for the deco alone! 🙂
Big Boys Oven
July 3rd, 2007 at 9:52 am
So which is better? CafeCafe or Banquet? I walked by this place a few time but must give them a try.
k.t.x
July 3rd, 2007 at 10:21 am
yeah, the chickpea seems abit too wholesome to b included in a main. i thought it shud be mashed abit.
walked by last weekend, deco seems too tackily white, and bad mix and match of decos…total yuck which many times, can b reflected on food altho not entirely logical….lol.
not my sort. lol. come to think of it, i m in a hunt to find good econ rice which can match my chosen one…lol.
Lyrical Lemongrass
July 3rd, 2007 at 5:38 pm
wmw: ya lor…always nice to check out a new place.
boo: I had very attentive service. The waiter kept catching my eye all the time! Butterfish had a nice firm texture. Try it.
cc: hehe…it’s rather pretty, isn’t it?
big boys oven: it’s hard to compare. One’s more casual and the other’s fine dining. Food is different too. Watch out for my cafe2 review…coming soon. 🙂
k.t.x: why do you say that the decor is “tackily white”? I’m curious about your “bad mix and match” remark too. Given, I’m more Philippe Starck than Laura Ashley, but I think I’d still be able to appreciate what Banquet is trying to portray – a pretty, feminine look that reminds one of whitewashed picket fences and spring. I suppose the glass panels don’t do much for the entire deco except to create the illusion of space.
Paprika
July 3rd, 2007 at 5:52 pm
I like the look of this place, so clean, pretty and shiny! Am yet to try the food here. Have heard mixed reviews so far. That chilli sauce looks kinda lame.
"Joe" who is constantly craving
July 3rd, 2007 at 6:42 pm
haha nvrmind mah..i wan to be famous!..yeah the butter fish i think is probably their signature dish so far..
jason
July 3rd, 2007 at 6:57 pm
The butter fish is real cheap! Now I’m craving for chickpeas… my mom used to buy that for me whenever we pass by the kacang putih stall.
Lyrical Lemongrass
July 3rd, 2007 at 7:49 pm
paprika: yeah, it’s pretty. I had higher expectations of the food, though. Try and let me know what you think.
njoe: but but but…I have no nipple shots of you! how to show??
jason: cheaper to get chickpeas from the kacang putih man in Brickfields. 😛
Lyrical Lemongrass
July 4th, 2007 at 9:29 am
team bsg: Your comment, as always, was a mouthful, and I’m saying it in all innocence. 😛 Did I see a compliment hiding in there somewhere? You are, as always, too high up there for me to achieve, both in terms of godly gluttony as well as command of prose. I salute you!
Big Boys Oven
July 4th, 2007 at 3:09 pm
Your CafeCafe review is very fast!!heheehe
teckiee
July 5th, 2007 at 4:13 am
Ah such a romantic place… after reading Mei Yen’s post and now yours .. must go … but hor… take the wrong person there and they will perasan.
Lyrical Lemongrass
July 5th, 2007 at 8:59 am
big boys oven:
very fast meh? too excited to post la. hehe.
teckiee:
Do go and try the food, but in my opinion, it’s a place to relax with friends, so anyone oso can wan. 😉
syee
March 31st, 2008 at 3:47 pm
hi lemongrass,
I went to the place after looking at reviews from you, meiyen, and sooyin.
Have to say the food was really good especially the butter fish and the rojak but the service was an utter disappointment. Not sure whether you’ve been there again but we will never return to that place.
Just want to share my experience with the rest of the food lovers and to you, but if you think my story is too long for your lovely blog, do edit as you wish ya!
My colleagues and I went to The Banquet last Friday (28/03/08) for a birthday lunch. There were 18 of us and we had expected slight delays on our orders for such a large crowd. The food was good, the ambience was soothing and we were enjoying ourselves. I had even wanted to compliment the staff who served us. That was until three of my colleagues could not get their meals still, one and a half hours later.
Apparently there was a mixed up. My colleagues’ orders were given to another table, a staff said apologetically. We accepted that and waited patiently. In the end, when the meals came, one of the three had only one spoonful of meehoon in her tomyam soup. She ate it anyway in frustration. We decided to talk to the manager before we would pay our bill.
A chinese man came by and a male colleague of mine briefly explained the scenario to him. The man coldly said he would only offer us free desserts and nothing else. My male colleague insisted on a service tax waiver and the man rudely uttered, “If you’re not happy, you should have left earlier”. He walked away after that.
We had wanted to leave immediately without paying but my manager was with us and she said we would just pay for courtesy’s and for our own responsibility’s sake. The Chinese man staff came again with an order form in his hand and called us liars. His reason being the time printed in the order form showed we’ve only been there for one hour as opposed to the one-and-a-half-hour claim we made. The other waiters were quietly looking on without clarifying the mixed-up earlier. We presumed the new order was made after the mixed-up but this would just be our assumption. It was then, that he slanderously called us, “No brainers since you can’t come up with cleverer lies and you have to come up with such stupid lies”. He continued on saying things like, “The waiting time is common and if you couldn’t wait, you should have gone to a hawker stall”. He certainly created a scene at his own outlet as our long table was in the middle of the restaurant and he was raising his voice the whole time. The restaurant was almost full with people.
In the end, we still paid the bill out of integrity. Another colleague of mine told the chinese man he will never come back to his restaurant. The chinese man said we were not welcomed there and he would not serve difficult customers like us.
david
April 1st, 2010 at 4:47 pm
oh wow Syee that sounds like a HORRIBLE experience.Not the first time I’ve read a good review,or heard astounding things about a place’s food,only to visit myself and discover intolerably bad service.I definitely won’t be visiting Banquet anytime,plus the exterior seems so pretentious.