Ruby Foo's
1626 Broadway (at 49th Street, Times Square)

A friend of mine asked me to lunch last week near Times Square...I know practically nothing in that part of town. He works nearby and had a short time for lunch, so I acquiesced to head into travel central. Goodness I hate tourists...and those people who have no umbrella etiquette! I nearly lost my eye a few times waiting in the drizzle for my friend outside of this restaurant.

I find these "multi-Asian" eateries usually with distaste, and sadly Ruby Foo's did nothing to change my opinions on these why-are-we-trendy places. The menu is a hodge-podge of strange Asian dishes done poorly, and the atmosphere is just Time Square if you know what I mean.

Instead of chancing on any of the main dishes, we just split a few starters. So many restaurants are trying to capitalise off tapas/mezes cuisine it is annoying -- and they seem to make incredible profit from them with those uneven prices. The fried calamari was horribly bland -- like if the batter was not seasoned. The steamed mixed dimsum sampler was not bad, but nothing special for that price. And the "glazed eel roll" was more papaya than eel (was there any eel at all?). Boring.

I left the place very, very bored. I wasn't revived until I reached the awesome Kurowycky sausage shop in the East Village where I loaded up on stuff for a few feasts. Why do so many people do these faux Asian fusion places when all they do is bad food? If they want to popularise dimsum in this atmosphere, they should learn from London's über-successful Ping Pong chain. Now that is trendy but good dimsum.

Skip this place. It is a disaster, especially those trying to avoid tourists. The food is bad, the service is shaky at best, and the atmosphere blows badly. Ugh, not good at all...

Food: C-
Atmosphere: C+
For Lone Diners: B (*)