I’ve always walked past Bosses @ Vivocity without a thought of eating there because it simply looked intimidating and expensive, and probably very pretentious. Imagine my surprise the first time I went to the restaurant on my colleague’s birthday. The décor was nothing special, but tastefully done, and the place was actually quite bright with sunlight streaming in from its huge windows, nothing like what its Chinese name “Hei She Hui” suggests.

And the food. It’s always about the food. The dim sums here are simply delicious! I’m really unwilling to share this information lest the place gets crowded, but I feel that the restaurant deserves some good publicity. Here goes. Come to Bosses during 2pm – 5pm and get 30% off all dim sum choices. Order the Har Gao, the Liu Sha Bao, and anything else you fancy. Recommendations include any dumplings, the Zhu Chang Fen (any), and the mango prawns. Do get the pot of tea to share too, it makes you feel all clean and washes down your food nicely. With the discount it’s quite affordable, and the damage usually comes up to about $30 for two people.

To order from the main menu is a little trickier. Some are nicer than others, and most are not that value-for-money. For first-timers, just try the dim sum. It’s good enough to make you come back for more.

Was deciding between Churrascaria & watever place we could find cos it was quite late & most restaurants in a mall tend to close early. Was half way up the escalator when the advertisement of "Bosses" caught our attention..hmm why not?

When we got there, it was 9pm, we were greeted by friendly servers who told us the last order is at 9.30pm & by 10pm we'll need to leave, well ok why not again?

The decor was mainly in black, looks posh but not intimidating for us (I mean solely for us).

We were urshed to our seats immediately and love the chairs, so cushy, my butt felt good already..1st impression counts, they won.

Service was good and we were not being rushed to order our food which we took a little bit of time for it, however halfway into taking pictures of the restaurant, we were told nicely that we are not allowed to take only pictures of food. I had a nice shot of the "service stand" which you can use to call the waitress, settle your bill etc" but since it has some prices on it, I will not put it up for their discrepancy.

1. Cucumber with "Fen Pi" - Love this dish when I was in beijing for 3 mth , a must have so I went ahead to order it. Didn't disappoint, love the silky of this particular noodles (crystal noodles) which they only serve as a cold dish. Can be a bit chewy for most but it's good for jaw exercise

2. Sharks fin soup - It happened to be their sunday promo, was so cheap so I ordered it too. Nice I must admit, you can see the real fins inside with others like shreds of sea cucumber etc, worth the money. Thought it would be shitty since it's so cheap

3. Xiao Long Bao - It's slightly sweeter than the normal ones I had but it's still good. Goes down well with vinegar

4. Steamed Fish - Marble Goby fish and it's downright fresh! I was tempted to finish the whole fish by sucking the meat out between the bones which I normally does at home :)

5. 3 cup chicken - The meat was so juicy and chunky, the gravy is great for rice but since I am on a low carb diet so rice for me

Ordere a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc, Australia, sweet and complimented the dishes.

One thing I noticed when going thru' the bill 1 day after was, I was told their snack was complimentry on the house which was the fish skin. However to my astonishment, I was charged $3.80 for it!!! How could they tell me it's FOC when I am charged for it?? It's nice, I wouldn't mind paying if they were to tell me I will be charged. I know that normally peanuts are charged in restaurant like for a $1 each but $3.80 is a bit too much isn't it?

I hope that the management will be something about it as I find that it's pretty absurd. I will 1 day go back to this place again, probably tell em to remove the snack away from the table.

I first time patronised this restaurant with my fren last weekend, outside the restaurant the decoration was very grand although everything is in black. Inside the restaurant, you can enjoy the meals and viewing the sentosa sene which is just opposite it.

I had been to different restaurants, the common problems are very hard to get the waiter or waitress attention, even have to wait for quite sometime then can order our food and have to wait for our food to be serve like waiting for donkey's years. Settling the bills also have to wait for quite sometime.

But over here, the manager surprised us by asking how to address us. It is very close and thoughtful of them to make us feel comfortable. Their waiter and waiteress, waited for us to get ready for our orders at one corner. We ordered a pot of Jasmine Tea, Claypot Rice, la mien and Soft Shell Crab. They served our food very fast too. The waiter and waitress refill our pot of tea with water whenever they passby our seat, they are very attentive to us without us waving to them to clear the table.

If anyone who wish to find a place for chatting, for family dining, for party, this is a gd place for it.

Must go for it.

30 OCT 2008

Due to some unforeseen circumstances (Baby Desiree decided to throw a loud wailing tantrum, a dinner for 7 at Bosses (黑社会) became a dinner for 4... Oh well.. the meal must go on!!

I have to say, the place is nicely decorated in dark colours… and I really liked it… just like the name of the restaurant… fit for bosses of the 黑社会…

The niblets Honey Roasted Nuts with coated with Sasames Seeds, to me, should be an enjoyable "starter". However, we were served a rather falt nuts... The level of crunchiness was next to zero and it was definitely not worth the $3.80++ they charged. ARGH! :FUME:

Thinking back, this actually pissed me off… we were actually told by the waitress that a Pot of tea will only serve 2, meaning for 4 people, we HAVE to order 2 Pots @ $4.00 a pot. What kind of freaking logic is that? Utterly -DUMB- I say!!

Fried Salted Egg Pipa Bean Curd [Rating 5.75/10]
This Fried Salted Egg Pipa Bean curd ($14.00) was acceptable… barely… The size of each of their Pipa Bean Curd was rather small (I had much bigger elsewhere). Also, we can’t really taste any salted egg… just some minced/mashed stuff…

Baby Pak Choy with Salted Fish [Rating 7.25/10]
The Baby Pak Choy with Salted Fish ($10.00) was rather nice. Crunchy Baby Pak Choy with a nice level of saltiness to it. More salted fish would’ve made this dish perfect!

Shanghainese Claypot Braised Pork Ball [Rating 3.5/10]
Admittedly, the Shanghainese Claypot Braised Pork Ball ($12.00) looked and smelt nice. Sadly, thats about it. The taste of the Pork Ball was nothing spectacular, and was kind of soggy… Mom actually refuse to finish her share! I guess it must have been THAT bad!! Frankly, I don't remember eating soggy 狮子头. They should be much firmer...

Chilli Prawns with Golden Buns [Rating 7.5/10]
Thank goodness they didn’t screw up the chilli prawns. For a medium-sized dish ($22.00), there were ample amount of prawns and plenty of heavenly chilli prawn gravy!

Golden Buns [Rating 7/10]
The 4 Golden Buns that came with the dish was barely sufficient, and we ordered 4 more at the cost of $3.20.

Red Bean Pancake [Rating 7/10]
Finally, for dessert, I ordered my personal favourite - the Red Bean Pancake ($6.00), and it was nicely done. Not too oily, not too sweet.

To me, this was a below average meal for the price we paid. I don’t think we will be returning here for dishes. However, we JUST might check out their dim sum in the afternoon if the 50% discount offer for dim sum is still on…

More Pics and other reviews can be seen here...

Bro and his gf suggested to dine here for my bday and so we all trooped down to Vivo for dinner.
Colour wise, black is the order of the day. Tables have a hidden drawer for the menu. Wait staff were all dressed in black and white.