Chalk Restaurant

I have dined at several excellent restaurants in Singapore and worldwide and I promise I'll be writing reviews about the good ones in Singapore soon. Chalk is unfortunately a restaurant that I would not recommend to anyone and here's why:

1. The bread is nice and warm, and the foccacia bread is tasty. But we were not offered any, despite having sat down for over 30 minutes. And the restaurant was not crowded on a Thursday evening (12 Nov). The bread eventually arrived after (a)we realised that other tables (perhaps it should be added that they were mainly non locals) were being served bread fairly promptly and (b)we asked them for it. Lets add that the one refill of bread was given only after we asked for it.

2. The ambience is pretty cosy, and hey they even have a couple of chalkboards listing their daily specials placed a distance away. Sounds like a fun dining experience. A local celebrity couple, recently married, then arrived with 3 friends (wow doesnt Chalk sound hip!) and 2 waiters appeared by the table promptly with the chalkboard, and the explained the specials to them. However, the chalkboard never arrived at our table of 9 friends. It later came to our attention that the waiters/waitresses were prompt in bringing the chalkboards to the other tables (oh have I said they comprised mainly of non-locals yet?) and in explaining the specials to them. Hmm.

3. The waitress took all our orders correctly and repeated them to confirm. And our glasses of water were refilled on a fairly regular basis. While we got off to a shaky start with the service, we thought perhaps things would improve from here. But it wasn't meant to be. My order of veal shank ossobuco with saffron risotto never appeared, even after waiting 60 minutes for it and after my other 8 friends had finished with their main courses. At this point I should add that the duck parppadelle and the trio of seafood is alright and the dessert sampler is good. But we could not finish our starter of foie gras and a main dish of gnocchi because we did not enjoy them. The initial taste of the foie gras is yummy, but there is an aftertaste, not common and not to our liking. The gnocchi was too soft for our liking. It would have tasted better if it was a bit more firm. I have read another review on a blog where the reviewer had the same view on the gnocchi.

For the record, it usually takes about 20-30 minutes for a risotto to be prepared and served in a restaurant, and the waiter/waitress should inform you when you order so you can consider if you wish to order something else if you are hungry (well, at least at restaurants which pride themselves on offering service anyway). Well, the waitress at Chalk certainly didn't tell me how long it would take for Chalk to serve a risotto, but surely (a) if it usually takes one hour to arrive, then it would be reasonable to expect them to inform you upfront, and (b) it isn't reasonable to take one hour to cook a dish of risotto, period.

Attempts by my table to hail the service staff at various moments for attention to check on my order were not successful. Perhaps it was because they were too busy with their one table of celebrities and serving the other tables of non-locals? I'm not really sure why. I would like to think not, and to give Chalk the benefit of the doubt that usually their service is consistent and it so happened we were just very very unfortunate on this occassion.

Because local or not, celebrity or not, everyone has to pay for service, no? And even if a restaurant does not impose service charge, it does not follow that they can choose to please certain tables only.(On hindsight, I also recall the one and only earlier visit to Chalk on a lazy Sunday afternoon at about 3pm a month plus ago, when it was rather empty, and I also had difficulty in getting service. It took quite a while to get attention to ask for milk for a cup of tea I had ordered, and then for the milk to eventually arrive. As there were no non-locals or celebrities there that time, I am hard put to think of a reason what is the cause for the dismal service.)

Eventually, we caught the attention of one waiter, who went to check on my order and returned to say "oh, they are cooking it and we can serve you in 3 to 5 minutes". No apology given. Wow.

5 minutes passed. No risotto appeared. My patience and appetite had waned completely by now. I considered cancelling the order. My friends started to feel really sorry for me, and by this time, hailed the person in charge at Chalk (lets call her "Chief") to check on the order.

Chief went off to consult the kitchen and returned a couple of minutes later to say the food will be here very soon, to which I replied "I'll cancel the order, I'm not very hungry". Chief then disappeared and re-appeared very quickly to say "I offer you my apologies. Do you really want to cancel the order? It will be with you in a minute." By this time, it was about the 70th minute (925pm) since I placed my order and I had begun to feel rather cross about the whole experience. Perhaps Chalk's view is that hey, no harm in waiting 1 more minute since you've already waited about 69 minutes right?

I asked for an explanation as to why the food took so long.

Chief's response was "I really don't know. They may have missed/skipped your order in the kitchen". Her "explanation" left me astonished. Well either Chalk's kitchen screwed up or Chalk's waiters who were supposed to serve us and to notice that food has not been served, screwed up. Or both kitchen and waiters screwed up. And I highlight it isn't a case of someone "may have" screwed up, the fact is someone or some people "must have" screwed up. Isn't checking that all orders have been served the most basic 101 of running a restaurant? Was there not going to be any attempt to sound more apologetic or offer to make any amends in any way? How about an assurance that "I don't know yet how this happened but rest assured I'll find out and ensure this won't happen again"? Some form of reassurance at least that this is a one-off incident and it won't happen again to any customer including us if we ever return. Even something like a "I'm really really sorry about this, please let us make it up to you" would have been more acceptable.

It was only after I said "this is not acceptable", did the Chief make the offer "I'll offer the risotto on the house". Shortly after, the risotto appeared. Without a spoon to eat it with. The spoon only appeared about, lets see, almost a minute later. Did Chalk notice the missing spoon because my colleague had gotten up to try to find cutlery from another table for me? Was I supposed to have attempted to eat risotto with a fork and knife? *gasp*

A little too late, would you agree? The damage was already done. Even if the risotto was fantastic (and objectively, it was alright but really nothing to rave about), the dining experience was marred and made all of us rather unhappy. I felt rather bad about the incident really because we were there to celebrate a birthday and it should have been a happy occasion.

I hear Chief is a co-owner of the restaurant. I would be happy to hear her views and while I hope the service improves here, I will never return to Chalk. My friends won't be either. Suffice to say, this place is not on my "must return!" chalkboard, and much like how chalk would taste, this Chalk leaves a bad aftertaste.

If you are looking for a place that fits the title, this is it.

Tucked away from the hustle and bustle of Orchard Rd at the foot of Mt Sophia is this second tenant at Old School. Used to be another restaurant which name I can't recall, this restaurant is perfect for nice quiet birthdays with loved ones, a date, or simply a nice dinner with a bunch of friends.

The food is above average and service was attentive though slow. The presentation of the food's not bad, and the taste isn't far from the looks.

Best duck confit I have ever tasted!

Hear that chef Marcus was ex Maxim's (paris) and ex Les Amis.

The Spaghetti Bolognaise and Mushroom Consome were also exceptional.

Felt the place could be a little brighter and interior more "designer". But the open deck area at the back was very nice. Also, at least the paintings were original, including some works by Namiko Takahashi Chan, who was an ex MGS girl (Old School was formerly MGS).

Almost forgot to mention that chef Marcus' wife Lauren (ex Laurent Bernard Chocolatier) helms the pastry and dessert section.
Tried the dessert sampler, Verdict : heavenly!