Friday, July 29, 2011

Bubba Gump

This was Crystal's treat to us for a combined Parents Day. And she picked the restaurant. We went to the Bubba Gump at Sunway Pyramid in Subang Jaya for the dinner. The Bubba Gump Shrimp Company is an American chain of restaurants apparently devoted to the Tom Hank's Forrest Gump idiosyncrasy. Bubba (Pvt Benjamin Buford) was Forrest's (Tom Hank) old army friend in the movie.


Outside the U.S., this restaurant chain apparently has only 10 outlets in the Asia Pacific region. Of these, 2 are in Malaysia. The other Malaysian outlet is at The Curve in Bandar Utama, PJ. We had lunch at The Curve outlet many months ago, and our dinner at Sunway was our second experience.


The place was surprisingly crowded in spite of the early hours that we got there. The restaurant has a typical American South outlook using a lot of wood and timber for its decor. There are dining booths and quiet corners, and even an old fashion bar.


We were ushered pass all these and led to a quiet dining room at the back. We were happy at the prospect of a peaceful dinner but sadly that did not last very long as we were soon joined by others. One family was particularly noisy.


The restaurant has an unique and mindless system of calling for service. If you need anything from the waiters, you flip a red "Stop Forrest Stop" car plate on your table...


Otherwise, you display the blue "Run Forrest Run" plate. Apparently, the idea is that if you needed service, Tom Hanks would stop his cross-America run to attend to you. How silly can it get!


There were only 3 of us for dinner. So our orders was somewhat limited. The first dish to arrive at our table was the "Run Across America Sampler". I think the name of this dish was as idiotic as Forrest was in the movie. It was a combo comprising of a generous amount of nachos with a very nice dip, some cold salad shrimps, some deep fried shrimps and some spicy deep fried chicken strips. The various foods in the big plate lined with pseudo newspapers, were really not bad. The shrimps were fresh - not at all "plastic". I particularly liked the dip for the nachos.


Next was "Shrimpin' Dippin' Broth". It was a spicy shrimp soup served in a small pot with slaw, rice and half a loaf of baguette. I found the soup or broth somewhat lacking. As the name implied, I believe we were supposed to dip in the bread. I would expect a dipping broth to be thick and rich. Instead, it turned out to be watery and bland. It was actually quite tasteless when eaten with the bread and rice.


The final (or rather the first) dish we ordered was the "Tossed Chicken Cobb". It was a salad with tomato, Gorgonzola cheese, egg, beef bacon, chicken and avocado, tossed with a raspberry vinaigrette. It should had been our starter dish. But we waited and waited and it did not arrive even when we finished our combo and the broth. We flipped the red plate. A waiter later told us that our salad was delivered to the wrong table. A young lady - supposedly the honcho waiter - came over to apologize. When the salad finally came, my family did not like it. They did not like the raspberry vinaigrette dressing and the avocado. It wasn't great but I was OK with it. Perhaps we should had gone for the traditional Caesar salad. Perhaps that would not had been mis-delivered.


Not everything was dismal. This glass of iced lemon tea was bottomless.


We shared a bread pudding with vanilla ice cream for dessert. Ordinary.


My verdict on the Bubba Gump - Run Forrest Run!

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