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Affordable luxury lunch deal
Madison is the steakhouse in the Four Seasons Hotel, which offers luxury beef cuts such as Matsuzaka and Kobe to Wagyu and USDA Prime, prepared in an American twist. It is one of the most luxurious steakhouses in Bangkok, and arguably the best in the 90's when the Four Seasons Bangkok was the Regent Hotel.
A meal for two at Madison may cost a local junior manager a month of his salary, say THB 20,000 with a bottle of nice wine, or half of the price without wine. Luxury does sometimes come with promotions, during weekdays Madison offers a tempting sixty-minute business luncheon deal, which is a 2-course lunch set below the mark of one thousand Thai baht, including Madison's renowned all-u-can-eat salad bar. It is a good chance for non-regular customers to sample Madison food and decide if it is justified to pay a luxury price for a-la-carte or dinner on another occasion.
Two weeks ago I revisited this once talk of the town steakhouse in Bangkok with an American foodie friend during lunchtime. The 3-course lunch set, THB 890++, consists of a soup or the all-u-can-eat salad bar, a main course with choices, and a desert with choices. It is a fairly good deal at this classy grill room. However the food didn't live up to expectations; the salad bar isn't as 'wow' as before, choices cut back and quality declined, for instance, scallops in one of the salad dishes had an artificial texture and tasted bland. Imagine the taste of an eatable rubber or Japanese fake scallops those kids eat! For mains I opted for pan-fried sea bass and it was quite good; but my friend wasn't as lucky as me. His grilled sirloin steak in black pepper sauce didn't have a decent beef flavor and was not tender, though not over-cooked. He described it as coffee-shop quality. The dessert, a creme burlee, was fine.
The food quality and taste aren't as good as last time I visited Madison, which was two years ago.
Madison ***1/2
Four Seasons Hotel, Bangkok
155 Rajdamri Road
Pratumwan, Bangkok 10330
Tel.: 02.126.8866
Open daily : breakfast 6 - 10:30 am, lunch 12 noon - 2:30 pm, dinner 6 - 10:30 pm, Sunday brunch 11:30 am - 3 pm
Pay (3-course lunch set without drinks): THB 890++
(a la carte 3-course around THB 8,000 without drinks)
14 comments:
The food here looks good but expensive.
Typical Four Season price similar to the Four Season here.
We had 3-course French lunch here (choice of Tilipia or steak or seafood)with our HK VIP customer last week for $15 US each.
The name of the restaurant is called Cafe Bizou.
It is famous for its good price.
Food is super considered this price range.
Cafe Bizou is a bistro style French restaurant in LA, always crowded and noisy, poor service, food is tasty, and the restaurant is renowned for its low corkage fee, only $2.
Hey we used to eat there TC, sad to hear that quality declined. Seems many restaurants are not as good as before, chefs and hotels in Bangkok don't care for quality consistent.
Stella, I kind of disagree it's expensive as it's a Four Seasons outlet, but they can't make such lousy steak and interesting scallops. This is just a very bad image for Four Seasons. When someone who just tried this Four Season's steak house and found out such a low quality steak, they would be disappointed and not even tried the other Four Seasons. Restaurants in such a high end hotels would ruin not just the restaurants but also the whole hotel. A single stain can look large during the chain of word-of-mouth. Even they charge THB599, they still need to keep the quality. It's a genuine Four Seasons hotel. If they can't do it, then don't do it. Very simple, but often there are some silly F&B manager or GM making such a careless mistake. One wrong button on a total loss in a battlefield. Remember how I got upset and have such a negative image of Siam Kempinski due to their "pin-ball" service in the restaurant. That's another good example. Not only Siam Kempinski lost one potential customer in the restaurant, but also one hotel room guest who will bring other "influenced" guests to try their rooms. :) So you know how awful time I experienced from Siam Kempinski.
Very disappointed with Madison @ Four Seasons, even it is lunch set at a promotional price, but it is insulted to serve a piece of coffee-shop standard steak to customer, even if Madison doesn't care its status as a steakhouse, but customers care! If the cost doesn't allow it, simply don't offer steak during lunch or cancel the lunch deal at all. Four Seasons hv some hits and also lots of misses. I remember one time I had dinner hv a friend at Madison, my friend had to reject a piece of sirloin steak two times until the third was cooked right. And Spices Market, after chef Ian left, food just taste as terrible as Sathorn's Baan Khanitha. (Asok's Baan Khanitha is better.)
This is why Le Normadie (Mandarin Oriental) has the best lunch deal, the kitchen and F&B r honest, every dishes cooked and served the same way that it would do for dinner, only in smaller portion (of course at a 'lunch' price), and impeccable service. I remember Madison's waiter so rush to serve the second course while I wasn't done with the all-u-can-eat salad bar. Waiter, not waitress, waitresses r friendly at Madison!
Anonymous 5:27,
Do you live in LA?
Yes Cafe Bizou is famous of its good price although service is not as good.
But due to the price(3-course only $15 US) it is still worth it.
Four Season is famous of its good food overall. The price is expensive(both food and hotel price) but it is worth it.
Maybe Four Seasons is trying to compete with Amici in Siam Paragon. If so, another competition for the worse. :)
Competition for the worst? Then that Two Insects Cafe shall join. Let's send them an application. Oops no need, they are automatically qualified.
Its renowned Sunday brunch is also quite expensive now, and not as good as it used to be!
Four Season is always expensive cross the board Nina. But before it is more worth it due to good quality of food and taste.
Anonymous, please note that I intentionally used "worse". It's a comparative adjective, meaning it's still ongoing to an endless point. Sorry it's not yet the worst. Take care, my friends.
Its "worse" here may still be better than other's "better".
However, due to is relatively expensive price it is not supposed to go "worse" when the price is going "up".
Madison was great... 10 years ago ...
PAD, that friend who rejected the sirloin steak twice was u .. hahaha
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