Cah Chi (Raynes Park)

I had a lovely lunch in Cah Chi.

I have never been in Korea, but the important fact is that the food was tasty, and the bill; 12 pounds with drink and service rate included.

The waitress was kind and they served me additional smal dishes before the one I requested.

I will pay a visit again, that is for sure.
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IVP
7 Overall rating
Food 7 | Service 7 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 7
Friday, May 28, 2010

Living locally and having heard some positive comments about this place my wife and I paid it a visit one evening. Now bearing in mind my wife is of Korean descent and we have sampled the very best (and worst) London has to offer by way of Korean cuisine I think we are well qualified to give a true assessment of Cah Chi restaurant.

The place itself is nice enough, staff seemed friendly albeit a bit reserved. We orderd dishes we had eaten countless times and that are traditional favourites - kamongee (fried chicken with spices and honey dressing), dol sot bibimbap (rice vegetables and minced beef in hot pot) and sizzling spicy pork.

Normally the chicken is cooked in small nuggets and is taken as an appetiser. At Cah Chi it came out in lumps the size of cricket balls. I bit through one and was confronted not by chicken but by a mass of nasty tastless deep-fried batter - almost gelatinous in texture without a trace of chicken. I think the flavour was there somewhere but totally lost in the slimy gloop of deep-friedness that was all you could taste. Appetiser done.

After 20 mins or so the pork came. It was presented on a sizzling hot plate and was so tiny in size as to have us wondering immediately if it was the right dish or, in fact, if it was a dish at all. It was so small and full of onion and other filler foods that we darent touch it for fear it would dissappear. We left it there while we waited for the bibimbap which took another 10 mins to arrive. Amazingly the portion size again was miniscule - no more that 2 spoonfuls of rice, a few straggly vegetables and at dusting of mincemeat that could barely be seen let alone tasted. Being very hungry we ate what little had been put in front of us in a very short space of time and wondered how it was possible to serve such tiny portions at prices ranging from 7 to 9 pounds per dish. Taste wise it was all rather bland and totally unauthentic and we simply wanted to leave to pick up some pizzas on the way home to fill the space that Cah Chi had been unable to fill.

Then came the bill. £40 for esssentially 3 dishes plus a diet coke and water. OK, we knew it was a bit more expensive that most other places and yes we had been ripped off before and would just have to put it down to experience. What we didnt expect was a 10% service charge added to our bill - non-optional! My wife politely queried this with the owner in Korean, who told her it was standard practice. When my wife told her that no, in fact it wasnt and we had never been asked to pay an obligatory service charge anywhere else she was promptly ''told off' in Korean by this older woman - as if she had spoken out of turn. I was astounded at the rudeness of the owner of Cah Chi to my wife, a paying customer and I then remarked in English how unhappy I was at the meal and insisted that the service charge be removed at once. This was done however not without this now rather irritating owner continuing to tell off my wife in Korean that she was wrong blah blah blah. By this time i simply wanted to get out of this place and away from this rather unsavoury individual - who thought it now appropriate to tell me how other establishments that didnt add service charges were in fact ''cafe's whereas this is a restaurant'' to which my reply was ''well why is their food 10 times better that yours then''.

The service charge to my mind is only an issue because they had added it without it being optional. Ill be the first to tip handsomely if the food/service are good but at this place neither were and the attitude of the owner beggared belief. She frankly should be ashamed of herself for serving such sub-standard food as well as speaking to paying clients using a tone that a schoolteacher would use to naughty children.

To summarise if you are thinking of eating at this place then expect to leave pretty unhappy as we did - their are countless alternatives a mile or so away in New Malden where there is more competition for custom. The problem in Raynes Park is that the only other Korean restaurant is the Phoenix which frankly is also pretty dubious so I think that the owner of Cah Chi has delusions of grandeur based on being the more popular of 2 awful options. And the back chat from the owner would put Ramsay to shame.....
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DP
0 Overall rating
Food 0 | Service 0 | Atmosphere 0 | Value for money 0
Sunday, May 02, 2010

This is a little neighborhood gem! We had a lovely evening and definitely planning to go again.

Some minor points of improvement. Soju was not that cold but they used a cover to keep it cool it. so it was better after a while. Portions were slightly small, we were full at the end but might have been a bit more.
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evrim - View all reviews by this user
8 Overall rating
Food 9 | Service 10 | Atmosphere 5 | Value for money 8
Saturday, July 04, 2009