The Line

Shocking! Just shocking!

When I pay $41+++ for a lunch buffet, I expect an abundance of good quality food - and piles of wasted food, Ugly Singaporeans who think they are Kings/Queens and again, Ugly Singaporeans who think it is their right to wipe out 10 pieces of freshly cooked oyster omelette once the chef puts them into the food warmer.

Today was just not one of The Line's finest moments. Within 1 hour from the buffet commencement (buffet starts at 12pm), the kitchen had run out of (and I STILL CAN'T BELIEVE THIS)

1) Chicken satay
2) Sausages
3) Laksa

I can't believe it because these are some of the popular items at The Line and the F&B purchasing manager should have known better than to have run out within 1 HOUR of the lunch buffet. Tsk tsk....*shakes head*

At $41+++ and at least 150 people having the buffet, that is a minimum of $6,150 of revenue (before tax) which should be more enough to pay for the cost of raw food and labour.

Okay, with that BIG BOO BOO out of the way, here's the review of the restaurant and it's food:

The Line was a place I visited within weeks of it being open for business. I was impressed with the place as the interior design was sleek and chic and really, quite elegant for a buffet restaurant. Within weeks of the first visit, I was back again! And again (that's about half a year later)! And again (another half a year later)!

When I hit my fifth visit a year back, that's when I finally had enough of The Line. So when it was planned that I have lunch here today, I was not quite sure whether I would be able to enjoy the food at the place.

Usually when I go to The Line, I operate according to the following guidelines:

- Hit the fresh seafood and sashimi counter
- Hit the sausage and roast counter
- Hit the Indian counter
- Hit the dim sum corner
- ATTACK the dessert corner

But today, I thought I should try a different tactic. So I did this:

(Warning: This should not be attempted by inexperienced large capacity eaters nor small to medium capacity eaters nor pregnant women nor little kids who want to avoid joining the fit club)

1) Hit the Chinese and Indian counters
Rationale: At 12:30pm, those counters are hardly patronised and when you see oyster omelette made on the spot, it equates to forecasted long waits and supply bottlenecks.

a) Oyster Omelette - Aaah, the oysters were fat and juicy and the omelette was done just the way (ah ha ah ha) I like it - which is, egg only, no flour. I drizzled the chilli over the oysters and boy, it really complimented the taste of the oyster (can't say the same for the chilli with egg).

b) Chicken (it's not tandoori and there were no food tags to identify the food I was eating. I just know it is chicken, grilled and white in color)
The chicken was succulent, well marinated. I squeezed lime juice onto it and the zestiness brought out the "grilled" tastes very nicely.

c) Minced meat Kebab (I don't know the meat and I didn't ask but I suspect it was lamb/beef)
Unlike other kebabs I've had, this one was moist throughout and had nice fresh herbs choped into it (not the dried ones which can be overpowering at times)

d) Tandoori fish
At first, I thought was tandoori chicken until the force I put to clench the thongs smashed the lovely looking thing into pieces.

I don't really like grilled fish fillets, but this one tasted fresh and didn't have too much of the tandoori paste left on it (post grilled) except for the nice orange color. When biting into the fish there was a nice resistance of the flesh against my teeth and also did not give that dry-ness which some over-cooked grill fish have.

2) Hit the western and salad section
I know how much I can eat and what I like to fill my stomach with. So the next stop was for roast beef and sausages and potatoes. Unfortunately, the roast beef was medium rare and I requested that my serving be cooked till pink. What I got was "very cooked" (2 stages away from burnt) and of course, I was not pleased. However, as I didnt' want to waste a good quality nicely salted piece of beef and finished it. If they had done my beef the way I had told them, the beef would be perfect.

The sausage was alright and obviously "quality stuff". I was really blessed that when I was at that station, there was 4 sausages there and I helped myself to one (yes, ONE because I want to eat other stuff). There's not much to say about good quality sausages as they all taste good. But I got bored with the sodium and got some Dijon mustard and tomato relish to put a bit of "fun" into it.

While waiting for my beef to turn pink, I headed to the salad station and made myself a nice portion of salad. Once again, there was no food tags and I needed to ask the sous chef at hand to run me through each dressing. I settled vinegrette and balsamic dressings just haphazardly drizzled over the nice fresh veggies. In terms of taste, there's really not much to say about the salad and the dressings were, sadly, not imaginative despite the variety available

3) Hit the ice cream counter
You know, its very nice to sit right in front of the ice cream counter where you can see the queue length real-time. Trust me, it really cuts down your queue time there.

Anyway, after doing the heavy duty roast beef, sausages, indian food and oyster omelette, my palette called for a half-time. So I had two scoops of ice cream - coconut and mango sherbet - topped with two generous scoops of sliced almonds. YUM....

The coconut ice cream was obviously made of coconut milk (the other version I've tasted@ Swirl Gelataria is made of coconut juice, which is lighter and more refreshing).

As for the mango sherbet, it was light (due to lack of dairy content) and tasted of mango puree.

Both ice creams were just nice in terms of sweetness and the texture was smooth

4) Hit the sashimi counter
There are some people in this world who can really "wallop" the sashimi platter. The sous chefs at The Line know that too! Which is why they have modified their sashimi serving system into "slice on demand". Although this creates quite a queue during peak periods, it ensures that people in the queue get at least a serving of sashimi and not be told "sorry, ran out because of that fella in front of you".

At The Line, you only have Salmon, Tuna and Cuttlefish to choose from. From that selection, I choose only salmon. The salmon sashimi was fresh and cut to optimal thickness. The only problem was that I had some 2mm of fish bone inside a few pieces of the salmon. That, my reader, is quite dangerous.

And as I had just eaten ice cream, my tastebuds were a little numb (I know because I'd eaten an earlier batch of sashimi my friend took for me.). To warm my tongue to "food tasting condition", I drank a bowl of miso soup and also took some ginger to cleanse my palette. Both were good moves because I quickly regained "taste bud consciousness"

5) Pick off my friends plate
At this point, I was feeling fat and lazy. So I just happily took some food off my friends plate. Namely the char siew pao and steamed mushroom with fish meat.

Both dim sum items were excellent. The char siew pao had enough meat inside the "bao" and the "bao pastry" was light and fluffy - although it did have a tendency to, occasionally, stick to my teeth.

Then I ate half of my friends tiramisu which were served in simple but elegant glassware. As the tiramisu was served individually instead of a communal-everyone-dig-in bowl, I had to dig through more mascapone than I'd prefer. But nonetheless, the mascapone was top quality and well chilled. The sponge fingers were also moist but not wet (which I can say, is near perfect). I couldn't taste much of the alcohol but I'm sure it was somewhere in there.

6) Check out the pasta station
Surely, you must feel full already, just reading what was eaten. But there was one more station I had to try. Since I had been craving for cream based pastas, I ordered a small portion of pesto cream spaghetti with LOTSA mushrooms. The cream sauce was not much to rave about but considering that it was at a buffet restaurant and not a specialty Italian joint, there was not much to complain, nor much to rave about. The pasta was cooked "on demand" and though I had to wait 2 minutes, I had fun just standing there watching the cooking demonstration.

7) Dessert storm!
I'm full now. But there is always space for desserts - as most girls will say.

Spying the cake counter, not much caught my eye except for the biscuit base of a chocolate mouse cake (which to my delight, most of the diners had left behind because they didn't know that they had to cut through it) and also a rhubarb mascapone cake

The biscuit base was delicious and I was so pleased to have so much of it to eat at one seating without eating the mousse portion.

The rhubarb mascapone cake (which is also the Shangri-La Cake of the Month) was light for a mascapone cake as the texture was like a meringue. I suspect that they used egg white to make the cake so fluffy and also to give it that "got foam" texture. The cake is not much to look at, which is a pity, considering its strengths.

-End of tactic-

To be honest, there was a lot more food available like crepes, assorted dim sum, roast duck, fresh prawns and crab legs....but I wanted to test-drive a different eating strategy.

But having said that, my strategy failed to allow me to burn the food in time for dinner and I still felt mild pangs of pain from "over stuffing". But it was better than when I was younger and less discerning to what I stuff myself with.

- Would I recommend The Line? -
Let's put it this way, I know of 5 kids whom I would like to take to The Line so they can experience fine buffet dining.

I would also recommend it to people who like good quality food with a wide variety in a buffet setting.

I would consider The Line the best buffet restaurant in Singapore, seconded by Straits Kitchen (which unfortunately is limited by its "local food" concept).

If you want class and style, The Line has them. And it doesn't hurt to have well-groomed servers, greeters and diners to provide the positive visual impact.

Yes, The Line buffet is expensive. But think of it this way, you don't need to eat the next 2 meals and if you spread the cost of your lunch/dinner over 3 meals, you'll be pleasantly surprised how cost effective the buffet is

Also, in terms of service, the staff really try their best to please you. When spoken to nicely, you will get a smile back (unlike servers at other establishments who "act dumb" and don't bother to mask their disdain at providing "service"). Also, they are very proactive. When a little kid dripped chocolate sauce onto the floor on his way back to the table (ala Hansel and Gretel), the service staff was prompt in cleaning the chocolate spots on the floor. They could have acted dumb and just left the chocolate on the floor, but they didn't.

5 ways to know that you've over-eaten at The Line:
1) You find excuses to NOT FINISH your food because...erm....it's too sour (I used that for the chocolate mousse in shot glass desert)
2) You start trying to look "cool" by stretching your body out and leaning against the chair next to you so you can ease that gradually "too stuffed in the stomach" feeling
3) The sous chefs at the food station recognises you and suddenly the portion they give you looks suspiciously "less" than the guy before you
4) You eat from 12pm, end at 3pm and don't feel hungry till 2 days later
5) You swear not to return to The Line again but end up going back 6 months later....or next week

BONUS HOW-TO:

HOW TO TACKLE THE LINE BUFFET?
1) Forget about the food in the food warmers (except the Indian station).
2) Go for the "on demand" food stations that will ensure that you get your food piping hot
3) Pace yourself. Don't eat so fast as it will give rise to a premature "fullness" that will force you to stop eating
4) Stick to "What you like" and "What you would like to try, that you rarely get to eat". Don't bother with fillers as there's too much food for one sitting
5) Don't just go for the "expensive" stuff to "maximise the value" of your meal. Eating should be fun and not a business transaction. There's really no point stuffing yourself with fresh oysters if you don't fancy its taste, nor stuff yourself with sashimi, even though you just recovered from diarrhoea. Just eat what you like. Enjoy yourself, eat leisurely.

Need more help? Give me a buzz and send me an invite. I'll coach you through it. Cost of one-to-one coaching: One "The Line" buffet.
Non-refundable.

I was invited to The Line by a friend on a Thursday night and the spread of food was mostly excellent ; from their signature salmon belly to grilled charcoal lobster.
So I promised my family to take them there on my birthday which was a Friday as I wanted to share my mouth watering experience with them.
The ambience and mood was incredulously perfect and the wide variety of east meets west food display were so tempting we did not give the waiter a chance to seat us properly as the table was reserved earlier.
We went our separate ways in double quick time to the four corners of the dining hall and came back rather swiftly with our plates quite full; mine all salmon belly and and all food japanese !!!!!!!
To my horror the salmon didnt quite taste the same as my last experience ; it was flat and a little rubbery. As I have been taught not to waste food I had to finish my plate which was sheer struggle . The consumption of my initial foray had left little room for its western counterpart of lobsters , oysters , prawns etc just to name a few.
With this initial error I had to be more discerning in my next choice and I promptly went over to the grilled charcoal counter and asked for a lobster to be served to me. The chef with a smile told me politely that they were out of stock that night and could only substitutue an almost look alike which came in the name of a tiger prawn ; he offered me two as he suspected the frown on my face needs some cajoling .
After the prawns which was surpriisingly fresh and succulent I was rather short of breadth and could only manage a couple of oysters; a char siew and a pau which my dear wife was quick to off load from her plate . Dont get me wrong ; it was my birthday and she had a fore taste
and they were truly great stuff . Fancy eating tim sum at the Line for dinner which was the best part of the dinner for me !!!!!!!!
I took a walk round the dining hall to say my farewell but not without just one more helping at the mee stall . Obviously the lady wasnt doing too well with patronage that night and gave me a sweet smile . I obliged with a little mee hoon and two fish balls. It did come out quite well except the fish balls were icy cold in their core !!!!!! ; reminded me of ice kacang except hot outside and cold inside.
I rounded the dinner with some fruits and two scoops of ice cream which caps the evening of celebrations.
When I asked my family their honest verdict they looked at me with nonchalance and in one fell swoop it says it all.
O I almost forgot !! When the bill was presented I enquired if there was a 15% discount on HSBC card and to my amazement the waiter was quite sure it didnt apply to that particular card. Before I left for the restaurant I had studiously checked the promotions available on HGW website and found HSBC is currently on their promtion list. This was then confirmed by a more attentive waiter and I would have been shortchanged by fifty bucks if not for this wonderful information provided by HungryGOWhere.com.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I went to the Line on wednesday night for the buffett and I must say that it was an utter disaster. For $68++ per person (bill came up to about $80 per person after tax), my expectation was top quality food. The oysters used were low grade, sashimi was stale and the food at the rest of the stations were horrible.

For the same price, the greenhouse at Ritz Carlton beats the Line hands down. In fact, the food at the Line is much worse than cheaper buffetts such as Element at Amara. I wouldn't even pay $28++ to eat at the Line, let alone $68++.

I can't believe anyone who dined at the Line could honestly give it a good review.

Caveat Emptor.