Asia Alive

Critic´s Review

• Food: 3 / 5
• Service: 3.5 / 5
• Decor: 3 / 5

-By Marryam H Reshii

A buffet so cleverly disguised that you'll never believe it's one

Intro: Enjoy a high quality of satays, dimsum, salads, wok-tossed dishes and noodles all brought to your table in this extremely unpretentious but novel eatery.

Atmospherics: a small, intimate restaurant with its own private dining room and wine library, Asia Alive has half a dozen counters, each with their own speciality. Order as many - or as few - dishes from each as you wish from each, then go back to your table and enjoy your meal as the food will be delivered in perfect co-ordination, just as it would in a regular a la carte restaurant. You want another helping of satays? No problem: the rest of the meal will be held up till you've had your fill of them. Service is seamless and unobtrusive. There's a tiny a la carte menu in case you are running short of time, but the buffet is where it's at, though the hotel refrains from actually calling it a buffet. Quite rightly so, because each element of your meal will be made up a la minute, the way it would in any other restaurant. Stale cooked food does not lie around for hours together, and that's the best part of Asia Alive.

Table Talk: There were six types of satays on the buffet on the evening of my visit and I chose Balinese fish, thinking that it would be the minced fish version that is a speciality of Bali. However, what I got was a section of a fillet on a satay stick! Not only that, the spicing was a bit too desi - and from a quick glance around the satay section, that seemed to be the trouble with most of the satays. What was excellent was the dimsum section. A variety of wrappers were used and whoever made them knew the art of varying the textures of the fillings to include crispness, softness and crunchiness, all in the same dumpling. The same was the case with the soup. It is like a lottery, where you order an array of dishes but don't watch them being cooked in front of you. However, the restaurant is really perceptive in figuring customers' orders and executing them correctly.

Plus and minus: The clockwork precision with which the dishes arrive at the table is what makes the whole rather off-beat concept work. Oh, and don't miss the teppanyaki ice-cream.