Super-Pricey Chinese Restaurant Hakkasan Has Critical Problem In Hell's Kitchen

One of the interior rooms at Hakkasan in Hell's Kitchen.

Jeez, things are not starting out well for the British-import Hakkasan. The giant upscale Chinese joint in Hell's Kitchen opened in April with an absurdly expensive menu ($888 braised abalone, anyone?) and since then things have not been going well, critically speaking. Ruby Foo's for rich people, anyone?

The first critic out of the gate on this one was New York's Adam Platt, who got that Ruby Foo joke in, while also saying the entryway felt “like I’m visiting Grandma Ethel’s ashes at the crematorium.” In his zero-star review he harped on the music ("an endlessly respooling techno-lounge dance track"), the tight quarters ("like you’re dining in a loud, not very well-lit chicken coop.") and the food. Oh, the food. Here's just a sample of Platt's feelings about that:

The first small-plates appetizer we sampled was a dainty $28 helping of crispy fried quail, which was crispy enough, I suppose, but cost roughly $7 per bite. It was followed by squares of $25 prawn toast speckled with sesame seeds and bits of foie gras (very good, provided you pick out the foie gras), and a festively colored assortment of classic Hakka dim-sum items ($28), which would have worked better if they hadn’t all been as hard as galvanized rubber.

One slam might not matter if it were the only one, but then today Ryan Sutton at Bloomberg came in with his 1/2 star review where he too harped on the unpleasantly expensive food. For example:

Hakkasan’s excellent service, lumbar-supportive seating and a respectful reservations policy make you wish for such comforts at small, ambitious spots like Red Farm or Mission Chinese. If only Hakkasan’s food wasn’t so stratospherically worse than at those fine restaurants.

All of which makes Ruth Reichl's recent prediction that place would close within the year seem easier and easier to believe. At least the Yelpers seem to like it? Well, except for the guy who calls it "straight out of American Psycho." So if you've been just dying for some very expensive Chinese food—sounds like you better hurry.