Food: Empire State Restaurant

Food: Empire State Restaurant

Good day to all, heres the first of a few food reviews that I have backed logged up to this day. This food review is on this western/italian cuisine type of food called Empire State Restaurant.Ate this at the Woodlands Branch and I am sure there are a few branches over the country that you can check out at the website below. Here is their icon or logo or something.

So is this place worth the visit? Read on to find out!

Food 2.5/5

This place is supposed to be famous for their empire burger which is pictured here

Its a giant burger that obviously will be too much for our Asian appetites but nonetheless at 22++ SGD if you are really hungry you probably can eat it. I didn't order this unfortunately so my food review will be based on what else i managed to eat which is pictured below.

Looks huge eh! Well its not as big as the burger

For me I ordered the next best choice which according the name, should also be one of their signature dishes cause its the EMPIRE HD for Hotdog! not High Def...

Look at it and it really looks very nice and cheesy but look closely you will realise that its only one portion that was with the cheese. The bacon is fine, texture and all but all in all the whole dish wasn't very special. There was no extremely strong taste of the sauce or anything and the fries obviously was just plain. The hotdog itself at best, just felt like another hot dog. Its not like those from that hotdog fast food joint with its RIPPERS and stuff. Nope, its merely just a hotdog.

Cheesy Penne

The other dish that we chose was supposed to be like some very cheesy type of penne thingy. That was what the name of the dish was supposed to be.. like 3 cheese pasta or cheesy pasta or something. Unfortunately at best, I would say that the dish didnt live up to its name. Worse of all, the pasta sauce was actually considered watery. Like someone put in sauce and added a bit too much water to it. Wasn't satisfying and at best it is just barely passable.

Fries with 4 sauces?

This was where it was totally sad for us. We ordered a fries that was suppose to come with various sauces. In the end, there was one mayonaise like sauce, another holder with chopped up tomatoes, another with olives and one more with a grand sum of 2 and a half piece of a pickle. Yep.. How is this supposed to work? ITs not a sauce is it? or is there some method to eat that I dont really know? Its probably that.. but overall, its not tasty at all... it might have been slightly cheesy but I really didnt know how those other 3 holders are sauces. The Mayo i still understand though...

Atmosphere 3/5

Atmosphere was average. It was the type of open seating whereby the seats are inside the shopping centre themselves. That means that this shop doesn't have an entrance per say and shoppers can just walk through the two eating areas as there is a walking path right in the center. Of course it has air-con and all that and I guess its just some style but all in all, there are better ways to do it.

Also given the two distinct areas belonging to the shop, the staff may sometimes be pretty hard to call over. I guess you could still sit there and buy their desserts and sit and talk but there are other choices like The Coffee Bean etc. The staff as a whole, are alright but it is obvious that they are slightly understaffed during the time we were there.

Price 3/5

Here is the receipt and the amount we spent for two people. Oh look... water is chargeable... Not sure why there is a need to charge for water in Singapore.. you can count it under service charge seriously.

Its not expensive per say, but its not really worth it. The fries for $5.90 was quite a bit and we actually didn't manage to finish everything. But overall I would say that quality to food taste, does not really match.

Accessibility 4/5

Perhaps the only good point of this eatery, its totally near the woodlands MRT station and also didn't have too many customers which means you can probably get a seat with no problems. But its most likely because the food is not distinct enough and tasty enough to attract the crowd. Still, it works in their favour...

Overall

Food: 2.5 (Overall,  its just passable. You won't be put off, but you will really expect more)
Atmosphere: 3 (Average atmosphere, you will feel that it can be improved)
Price: 3 (Charging for water? Not entirely cheap either for the quality)
Accessibility: 4 (Good location, easy to get to, probably won't have a queue so you can start your dinner faster)

Overall: 3.125 (Surprisingly the score is above 3. I would say that you could choose this place if you really wanted western food or italian food and you don't want to queue and just want to get dinner over and done with. Yea that would be the best explanation for this place at this point of time. Eat there once and see for yourself and if its ok type of food, then you can come more often. For me though, not entirely impressed and probably won't revisit unless there is a strong impetus.)

Here is its website http://empirestate.com.sg/ in case you want to try it out. Maybe try out some other dishes and tell me if it is better...

Disclaimer: Since this is a neutral or slightly negative review, I would like to say that all this is just words of opinion based on the dishes we had. Its not a professional review but the first impressions of a layman as per blog objective. So please don't be offended if you are a staff from there!