“Can I have my curry please?!”
The Oakham Curry Club (OCC) is a well-respected Institution with multiple international franchises.
The OCC takes pride in searching out the finest Indian Restaurants, and providing an impartial review of Curry Houses all over the world. Members vote anonymously on 5 categories - and an average score is given to each restaurant we review.
On Friday 9 February, the OCC Hong Kong branch visited vegetarian restaurant Khana Khazan. This was the first time the OCC in Hong Kong had visited a purely vegetarian restaurant and there was much debate from the members as to this suggestion as we like our "meat at the meet". After a disastrous evening with the worst service I have ever experienced in a restaurant in my life, we will not be going back to Khana Khazana. See scores below.
For full disclosure the scores from the previous meet are below (ranked out of 10).
Quality: 6.1 Value: 6.2 Service: 1.9 Customer Care: 3.7 Atmosphere: 5.8
Total: 4.7
It is actually impossible for me to comment on the main course as I had to leave before the main course was brought to the table as we arrived at 7:30pm and we were still waiting for our curry at 10pm!
This is not fake news or a fake post!
The other members gave the overall food quality a 6 out of 10 so maybe it was only a little below average but the wait was insane. I was asking the manager and waiter "can I have my curry please" but every time I asked the wait seemed to get longer. At 9:30pm it was 5 minutes, then at 9:40pm it was 10 minutes, and at 9:55pm it was another 15 minutes (at which point I had to leave). The staff were rude, and didn't seem to care, and we were thinking they were just happy for us to sit there and order more beers as we were a strong crowd of 12 OCC members (who all love a Kingfisher, natch).
Before that the food was actually ok / good: they brought out some crispy poppadoms and tasty sauces and some other starters which got smashed by the lads (always a good sign although obviously there was no swaying by the members - this is the OCC after all - no swaying allowed). They also brought out a dosa that we hadn't even ordered that was filled with potato and sauce which was a great touch. Again it got smashed sans swaying.
That's why I was so disappointed with the wait for the main course and the fact that after 2 and a half hours in a restaurant I still hadn't eaten my curry.
The restaurant was full of people of Indian descent so we were excited when we sat down to eat but it massively failed to live up to expectations. Maybe the staff were prioritising the local, regular customers. Maybe they loved the atmosphere we were "bringing" or maybe they just felt so honoured the OCC was in their curry house that they wanted to make the dish perfect. I guess we will never know.
We will never go back there either....