We came for a friend's birthday and did the Red Farm/Decoy group dinner prix fixe option - still a little confused about the merge of RedFarm and Decoy since there is also another prix fixe option for just RedFarm, but we had a great experience!
The prixe fixe is quite expensive at $95 a person, but it really does include a lot. The first course is an assortment of 4 different types of dumplings: shrimp and truffle, 'five flavor' chicken, vegetable and peanut, and soup dumplings. I loved the shrimp and truffle ones - such a nice flavor combo! - and the soup dumplings were steamed to perfection. They even provide vinegar and ginger so that you can eat it the traditional way. You only get one of each dumpling which was a little disappointing, but makes sense considering the sheer volume of the meal.
Then we got a foie gras tart that was cutely shaped in the form of a duck. This was probably the most underwhelming part of the meal as I felt that the fruit and tart aspect hid the actual taste of the foie gras, which should have been the star. I'd recommend eating the foie gras separately from the rest of the tart to get the full taste of it.
THEN we got the star of the meal - the Peking duck! It's actually quite rare to find a good Peking duck place in Manhattan, and I think this was the best I've had so far. Crispy skin, juicy meat, and all your typical accompaniments of scallion, cucumber, pancakes, and hoisin sauce. They even provided sesame and cranberry sauce which I thought was cool, but I still find hoisin to be the best pairing. There was more than enough for the six of us and honestly the meal could've ended there and I would've already been filled to the brim.
HOWEVER, then came FOUR MORE dishes - a steamed sea bass, prime rib steak, roasted duck noodles, and sautéed snow pea leaves. The sea bass was delicious and the only thing that could've made it better would've been some rice. The snow pea leaves were simple but flavorful and a much needed vegetable for a very meat and carb heavy meal, and the duck noodles and steak were also great. I will say that I found the steak to be an interesting choice for an Asian restaurant and didn't eat too much of it.
They also provided two slices of chocolate cake with ice cream for us to share since it was a birthday dinner! At that point I was already nearly incapacitated from how full I was but managed to squeeze in a bite. It was very rich and not too sweet which is just how I like my cakes.
I don't think I would do the set menu again because of the price, but I'm really glad to have had the experience. The dishes were delicious and the wines we ordered were both very good. All the servers were great and even let us sub out a vegetable fried rice for the duck rice noodles, and the setup of Decoy (separate entrance from RedFarm) is very nice and intimate. The bathroom even has one of those fancy heated bidet toilets which was fun. My only qualm is that they had a strict 2 hour limit for reservations which seems short for big parties. But, all in all, a great experience! read more