I've eaten out a lot, and all over the world. We're talking Ecuador, Thailand, Vietnam, all Malaysia, Japan, over Europe. But never have I had a meal quite as completely lacking in any virtues as the one I endured at Mabo. Firstly, I was feeling pretty thirsty having explored Liverpool and wanted some water before coffee or beer.
No free tap water.
This in the UK is just horrendous... I mean why? For me that's instantly a terrible sign. The woman serving us looked on with a silent look of contempt as my protests waned. Ok, no water for us...
Never mind, I'll just have a coffee. Me and my friend order some stir fried noodles from the sour faced matron, mine's with duck, his with chicken.
I thought "hey, we're in China town, the meal costs £8.50 and the place hasn't spent much on decor, so its probably gonna be really nice low budget food!"
First comes the coffee: standard small instant coffee with milk. No worries, coffee isn't particularly chinese, it will probs cost £1 or something.
Then, the stir fry....
Noodles, briefly fried with some frozen sliced vegetables, then drowned in what can only be described as gravy. I kid you not. Noodles and gravy was what was served.
Chinese stir fry? £8.50?
This was nothing close to the many delicious chinese stir fries I've had for less money, and also in the UK. There was nothing remotely chinese about it. save perhaps for the style the duck was cooked, which was to be fair pretty passable. My friend had almost exactly the same, except he couldn't even force his down.
We should have left without paying. Good God I wish we had. But I've never done that before and was too tired and hungry to bother.
Sure, I've eaten things that tasted even worse before, but they were in weird places where i didn't know what I was ordering, and they always cost a lot less. This was inexcusably bad for the price. And in Chinatown! Disgraceful!
Finally it's over and we get the bill... On top of the appallingly over-priced food, the coffee was, wait for it, £3! For dish water instant coffee! Sorry what just happened?
In the end I was robbed of £11.50, for an awful experience. The awful value for money is what makes it all the worse. Imagine going to Subway with that much money.. that's what I kept thinking as I forced down the greasy, flavorless noodles...
I wish I had taken a picture. read more