Crowning the Lobster King — Closed
Thanks to Leslie Kelly at the Commercial Appeal, we tried a great new Asian restaurant tonight, Lobster King. I have not been for Chinese food in a very long time because I am tired of the limited, Americanized choices. One dinner at Lobster King has me excited about the possibilities of Asian food again.
Sorta Sister Squirrel and I went while Mama Squirrel and Squirrelly, Jr., are making their way back from Hawaii — not an easy process thanks to Hertz, a slow shuttle, and a missed flight. I feel quite guilty having such a good meal while they are having such a miserable day. Still, they got a whole two weeks longer in paradise than I did, so I feel a bit better.
Lobster King has two different menus — one American and one Asian. The American is pretty and loaded with pictures. The Asian version is dense with choices. Go for the Asian menu. Even if you go for a more Americanized choice, it’s great to see the Asian flavors and ingredients and the wide variety of seafood available.
SSS and I weren’t sure what to try so we went with the appetizer sampler and the dim sum sampler. We also had spring rolls, won ton egg drop soup, and roast pork noodle soup. The appetizer sampler had fried shrimp, fried clams, shrimp rolls, pork, and another interesting roll that I would have asked about if I hadn’t been so busy stuffing my face. The small dim sum sampler came with two each of five different dim sum. Again, I should have asked for more details, but it’s rude to talk with your mouth full. I will ask more when we return on a Saturday or Sunday for the dim sum cart. That’s right, a cart is rolled around so that you can have your choice.
The spring rolls are beautiful. Translucent rice paper wrapped around shrimp on rice noodles on mint leaves. Green onions in the center add flavor and color because their stems are allowed to extend well beyond the roll. The spring rolls are very light. I didn’t think they stood up well when eaten with the spicier elements of the menu. I think they would be perfect as a first course or taken between courses of spicier items. The soup was the only thing that was less than thrilling. The only thing missing was a bit more salt. Both soups were very flavorful when we dosed them with a bit more salt.
The item that is missing from all the food is MSG. The chef uses no MSG in any of his dishes, and they don’t need it. The chef’s deft touch with fresh ingredients and seasonings are all it takes to make great food.
The samplers were the perfect choice for a first trip. Not only did we get to try a wide variety of items, we had lots of time to consider the two menus. We saw a lot of items that we want to try when we go back. And that will be very soon.
Lobster King Seafood Restaurant — Closed
32 N Cleveland Street
Memphis, TN 38104-2302
(901) 726-9388
Yay! No MSG = I can have their stuff, except for the shellfish, which I can definitely live without! Wo0t!
It is no doubt that the food in Lobster King are good. However, when you go to eat dim sum on the weekends, beware what they bring you. Many times they will bring out dishes of shrimps and vegetables and will try to dump expensive dishes on your table. Also watch for what they charge you. They will change prices of their dishes on unsuspected customers and since they do not use their cash register sometimes they will add extra charge to your bills. They also keep changing the prices of their dim sum. It is different every week. So beware.
My husband and I, with another couple and their kids, and my aunt (who is visiting from CA) just ate at Lobster King this afternoon. A friend had told us that the food was delicious! The food was good BUT the service was LOUSY!!!! Our server stood on one part of our table and just ‘threw’ the table napkins on our plates, instead of going around the table. He asked us for our drinks. But he did not wait for each of us to say what we wanted and just quickly turned away and said “all water” even when two of our friends wanted soda. When he refilled my aunt’s (who was sitting beside me)drink, the server did not go to her side but instead poured the water from my other side with his arm across my face without even saying excuse me. He told us we could not order any dim sum since we came in at 335pm and they only serve dim sum from 1130 – 330. We said we will order from the menu, even if we actually went there for their dim sum. A few minutes later, an American family (we are Asians) came in and they allowed them to order dim sum. That’s when we started complaining and the server went ahead and allowed us to order dim sum.
Another server “Terry” came to our table and offered us the dim sum dishes. Terry was pleasant and friendly. My friend and I were really upset then but my husband just encouraged us to enjoy our meal and then talk to the manager later. All of us agreed that we would give our tip to Terry at the end of the meal. We commended Terry on his service and on the food.
My husband paid the bill and gave the tip to Terry. The first server (unfortunately we were not able to ask for his name.) then came to our table, looked at our receipt and stated, “So this is your tip? Ok. Ok.” Then he started mumbling. We then asked the “head/manager/front person who sits people” if there was something wrong with our tip. He said, “No, no, it’s ok. It’s usually 15%.” That’s when we all got upset. We told him that we were not planning to leave a tip in the first place because of the poor – no, RUDE service we had but because Terry was good to us, we just wanted to give him a tip. Our tip was 13.44% of our bill!
If you experienced what we had, would you leave a tip? Would you ever go back to Lobster King? It’s a definite NO for us! And we will surely tell everyone we know NOT to go there!