My friends and I decided to give Pacifica cantonese a try rather than going to our favorite place (Try Thai)
On arrival there was just one other set of diners there as it was quite early on a weekday. The restaurant itself is very sterile in my view, white walls and fancy curly cutlery, square plates etc all very upmarket but cold and unwelcoming, the restaurant is shaped like a square box.
We decided to go for the £25 per person banquet which we thought would give us good value and a nice mix of food.
The starter arrived which is described on the menu as Pacifica hor's oeuvres (no less) this consisted of 6 small triangles of prawn toast, 6 small sticky ribs, 4 prawn parcels, 3 curry spring rolls which had been cut in half to make 6 pieces and some seaweed.
Even though they were tasty enough, I thought there would have been a more adventurous selection on offer.
Then came the duck, which came out looking like the chef could barely force himself to put some on the plate! There were 6 pancakes, enough for 2 pancakes each and there was JUST enough duck for those 6 pancakes, if you made them small and packed them with the 2 side plates full of cucumber they provided to beef the dish out a little. I felt a little short changed by this point and the duck was dry and old, like yesterday's duck warmed up.
Finally the mains, Sizzling lamb with ginger and spring onions this was very nice, good flavor, lamb bit chewy butnice.
Sizzling Fillet Steak This tasted horrible, I cant even describe the taste, it was just blah with syrup! just remember when they say fillet steak (we think of yummy soft FILLET STEAK!) they actually mean tough thin tesco quick fry steak thats been filleted! theres a massive difference lol)
Sweet and sour Pork Same as it ever was, nothing special to say about it, tasted ok.
Yeung chow rice This was like boiled rice which had teeny bits of pork and peas egg etc but it wasnt stir fried it was boiled rice lol, could have made this at home myself to be fair.
Stir fried noodles They were the really skinny noodles which go dry and I was literally cutting it with my twisted knife and fork!
We didnt stay for the fruit platter, im sure we didn't miss much.
SUMMARY I like a chinese where I can get good and dirty! lol , get my hands in there and feel comfortable and share food with friends but this place thought far too much of itself without having the excellent food nessasary to carry such notions off. The owner must have an ego the size of Ben Nevis!
The food produced was little and no better than that I could find in many different Chinese restaurants around town except it felt so posh and over done you couldn't relax, you felt like you were being terribly uncouth by picking up the spare rib with your fingers lol
I Wont be back as it simply gave me no reason to. Im a little perplexed over the gushing reviews on trip advisor, all I can say is you must get out more this is NOT the best chinese in manchester. perhaps the best looking, but its style over substance. read more