Momofuku Seiobo - two hits and a miss in the restaurant reviews this week

I don't think I'm being cynical to suggest that when the same restaurant turns up on the dining review pages of a city's two major newspapers that the restaurant's public relations department has had a success. And so it has been this week with both the Sydney Morning Herald and the Daily Telegraph opting on Tuesday to feature the Star Casino's Momofuku Seiōbo. The critics for both papers had complimentary things to say and the timing of their visit was sensible enough given that Monofuku changed chefs, and with that introduced a menu with a different emphasis, earlier this year.

But with my cynical journalist's hat on I could not fail to noticed that Tuesday's praise followed the exclusion of Monofuku from John Lethlean's Top 50 Hot Restaurants in the Weekend Australian magazine on the Saturday preceding. The blow of being dropped from this influential national listing was certainly softened by flattering home town reviews. I just wonder if that PR department had an inkling that Monofuku was on the way out and acted skilfully because of it.

Whatever. It is differences of opinion that add interest to restaurant reviews.

On this little blog we try and feature a variety of serious appraisals. You buy your paper and take your choice and to help we give a little summary of who is writing about what in our newspaper restaurant reviews section.

Follow the link and you'll find the list of the major writers.

And their recent offerings.

Click on the "Our summary HERE" to go to our summary of the restaurant that has been reviewed.

Recent postings on the blog are:

Momofuku Seiobo - Sydney Daily Telegraph
Momofuku Seiobo - Sydney Morning Herald
Rosie Campbell's - Sydney Morning Herald
Lester & Earl - Gold Coast Bulletin
Coast - Brisbane Courier Mail
Abbondante - Melbourne Herald Sun
Hattori Hanzo - Melbourne Age
Das Kaffeehaus - Melbourne Age