Rasa Penang

I ate here for the first time with two friends the other week - the only positive thing is that the staff are very friendly and nice. I am from Malaysia, and I can say that I was terribly disappointed with the food. We ordered some chicken and beef satay for starters with some squid in chilli and I have not tasted such poor quality in a very long time. The chicken and beef was very dry and didnt taste fresh at all, nor did the squid taste of anything. The peanut sauce for the satay had the thickest layer of oil I have ever seen! The mains we had was not much better, we ordered a laksa, and a mee goreng and a char kway teo noodle, and the laksa was so so, but the mee goreng and char kway teo was absolutely awful - have never tasted mee goreng that tastes like that before! My friend left most of it, and I didnt eat more than half of my char kway teo - it had no resemblance whatsoever to the real thing! The food was disappointing to say the least and is not authentic tasting at all!!! As a Malaysian, I really wish restaurants wouldn't serve dishes that they cant cook since Westerners will try it and get the wrong impression of Malaysian cuisine. I have been eating at Satay House in Paddington for years but I thought I would try something different for a change; wish I hadn't...

This restaurant is amazing! I advise you to not read the reviews above the are complete lies and mean, unjustified reviews. I enjoyed a delicious starter, main course and lots of Chinese side dishes for a perfect price. The staff were really friendly and my food came freshly to my table very quickly witha smile. The food had a nice and original taste and I could tell it was home made. I really enjoyed my night out here it was very enjoyable-food and service = emmaculate. I often have takeaways from Rasa Penang now. PLEASE, THE REVIEWS ABOVE ARE NOSENSE. Go to this restaurant!!!

I forgot to mention the rice (fairly important). It was so dried out and springy (rather than sticky) that you could have made a ball with some and bounced it. Also, no price would be good value for the quality of what is served, but it is not cheap. A small side of green-skinned (?) aubergine swimming in congealed pinkness was £5. I don't like saying these things when the staff is so nice, but what they are serving is a crime against food.

Wow, how things have changed since you reviewed this restaurant. This is the first time Time Out has let me down, and in spectacular fashion. The food here is inedible. As in I had one mouthful and closed my knife and fork. The chicken was red and bloody (yes, little flecks of blood) and the Koh Pan chilli prawns, which I was told would be spicy, turned out to be sweet and sour (with cashews?) of the lowest grade imaginable. I cannot touch sweet and sour at the best of times, but this tasted like there was a packet of sugar in the shiny red gloop. A malaysian chicken curry had a texture I hope never to try and discern again - something like you imagine a sauce might taste if you added a lot of flour by mistake. Spicy aubergine was in no way spicy, just oily and slimy and more gloop. Even my glass of chardonnay was no such thing by any stretch of the imagination - with barely more colour than water it tasted like a low grade pinot grigio at best, more like 'Italian white' - the kind you get in a box. Tom Yum soup had the same strange texture as the curry, which made me wonder if it had come from a box, and everything came out alarmingly quickly. Staff were sweet though - so you do what you have to do, you swallow (air, having so looked forward to your meal out) and pay. But I have never resented paying for food this much.

Dont order from here unless you want to wait forever for delivery. V poor service. I wouldnt advise.