Akuna

From the excellent service staff to the immaculately plated food, it was an experience for the senses. Taste wise, there were more hits than misses, but generally they are above average. It is also commendable that locally sourced ingredients were incorporated into the dishes. Akuna may be priced higher than many restaurants but it was worth every dollar. Given the number of courses served for dinner, it was actually a fair price! They even gave us a box of delicious marshmallows for supper. If you need a meal for special occasions, I highly recommend this.

Totally pretty and definitely a treat to the taste buds! Only a couple of items didn’t suit my palate but even then I would say those were put together really well. Overall, intensity of tastes was fine just right, ingredients very fresh, and presentation is top notch. Not sure if the Chef usually comes and greets the diners (which is my experience at other M* restaurants), but he didn’t here. Restaurant was pretty empty but seats by the window are only reserved for table of 2. Perhaps be a little flexible when the restaurant is hardly full? Overall it was a pleasant experience.

Impeccable service, presentation, wine pairing, and view… but the food was awful, with slippery textures, no distinct flavors in any of the courses. It was very confusing and muddy! This is the most expensive bad meal we’ve ever had.

I will give credit where it is due, the presentation of each meal was excellent and the staff were lovely, however i attend dinner to enjoy my food and enjoy i did not. Dinner started with a palate cleanser of biblical proportion, my wife was left looking confused by the 3 options served upon what i can only describe as a deconstructed vietnamese hat. The first course was confusing to look at, however the best tasting of the night, an egg yolk presented in it’s shell, with caviar and cream fraiche, tasty, yes, confusing, also yes. Our second course we continued with perhaps a little hesitation. But our third course, all hope was lost as they rolled out the sliced sea cucumber (the texture is as you would expect) and i received the extras from my wife as she believed firmly, sea cucumber belong at the bottom of the ocean. Our optimism returned with back to back hits! A palate cleanser of damper with Vegemite and goats cheese (we may be biased as Australians but these did help Akuna’s case) and confit pork jowl to back it up, also quite enjoyable. As we believed this would improve the flavour we paid the extra 2 million dong for some truffle shavings on our next course (this was very aesthetic as they shave it in front of you) however aesthetic was as far is at went, as we quickly realised there was no flavour to the truffle, at all. The rest of the meal, mouse deer and fermented yabbi was tough and very bland. The palate cleanser for dessert was i believe the pièce de résistance, a biscuit resembling a goldfish, filled with a jam that was overpowered by the mediocre texture and taste of the biscuit, reminding me only of the soggy bit of biscuit that has fallen into the bottom of your tea as you dip your scotch finger into it at 11 at night. Our dessert, was a trio of jelly and a sliced up melon, the melon was fine, you could run your car on the jelly. Nothing to write home about. Last dessert came out in 2 baskets hung on a yolk, at this point, we were ready to go and this did not improve the mood as much as one might hope. The whole experience was confusing and the friendly staff can only make it so bearable when you spend 12 million dong to eat good food and realise the pho from lunch could have comfortably replaced any of these courses.