Ok. I’m a huge Jackie Chan fan. Sue me. But despite my love of all things “Jackie Chan”, his new restaurant at Doncaster Shopping Town SUCKS. Has “Chan the Man” sold out?

The ONLY redeeming quality [...]]]> Shop 300 / 619 Doncaster Rd, Doncaster
Phone 03 9855 8367

***THIS RESTAURANT HAS NOW CLOSED***

Ok. I’m a huge Jackie Chan fan. Sue me. But despite my love of all things “Jackie Chan”, his new restaurant at Doncaster Shopping Town SUCKS. Has “Chan the Man” sold out?

The ONLY redeeming quality about Jackie’s Kitchen is they put ice in the water and the jasmine tea was good.

The restaurant itself is sterile. Not much thought was given to changing the previous franchise’s decor (ahem…Smorgy’s). New tables and chairs were the extent of the renovation. The paintwork was scratchy, and the veneer was peeling off some of the furniture, and pukey apricot tablecloths should be outlawed in food venues. Period.

We were seated in a rather nonchalant offhand manner, and it took the wait staff around 15 minutes to take our order. No, they were not lacking in numbers – we could see about six of them milling around in the far reaches. Also, trying to crack a smile out of them was near impossible.

We opted for the banquet, which is usually a good (and cheap) way of sampling a variety of dishes, especially as the standard price for a main menu item ranged anywhere from $18 to $30 (not cheap by Melbourne standards). We ended up paying $24 per person for the following crappola:

• Spring Roll – yeah, must admit it didn’t taste too bad. But how can you go wrong with something that is deep-fried?
• Dumpling Sampler – why give a two banquet party five dumplings? Do we fight over the fifth dim sim? That really wasn’t an issue here as the dumplings were as tough as golf balls. Secondly, who the heck serves dumplings without any condiments? Not so much as a soy or sweet chilli sauce. The waiter disappeared so quickly I had to get up and help myself to the soy sauce from a couple of tables away.
• Lame-arsed Peking Duck – some type of shredded poultry substance generously (and I repeat GENEROUSLY) slathered in hoisin sauce. The meat was miserly and the crepe tough.
• Crab / Sweet Corn Soup – should be renamed gluggy cornflour and no salt soup.
• Braised Prawns & Veg – The broccoli was really good. Uh huh. I really loved the broccoli.
• Lemon Chicken – Okay, this one wasn’t too bad. Where can you go wrong with battered chicken breast? In this case, it was the sauce. It was glow in the dark bile yellow. Hmm.
• Fried rice – greasy greasy greasy.
• Fresh fruit – I take umbrage to the word “fresh”. Four slices of floury watermelon and half an orange.

I must admit I expected a lot more from this place. I had internet searched Jackie’s Kitchen USA, and it looked promising. Healthy asian salad options. Interesting claypots etc. Unfortunately I feel the following way about the Melbourne version :

It sucked.

***THIS RESTAURANT HAS NOW CLOSED***