Shook! at Starhill Gallery: Sunday champagne lunches review

This review is brought to you in part by Shook!

It’s been years since we stepped into Shook!, the longtime centrepiece of Starhill Gallery’s Feast Village, but returning here is like a reassuring embrace from an old friend – the restaurant remains as exuberant as ever, with the festive liveliness particularly pronounced for its Sunday buffet lunches, when families and friends come together and linger for hours of merriment.

Mad Hatter Sunday lunch

Typically, Shook! hosts a Mad Hatter-themed lunch each Sunday; we were here for Father’s Day, with the entire buffet remaining intact. Shook! continues to advocate four primary show kitchens that bustle with action and energy – Chinese, Japanese, Italian and a Western grill – with a smorgasbord of temptations across the counters:

fresh seafood to cold cuts and multiple types of house-cured salmon, red meat and poultry galore, soups, salads and stews, rice and noodles, creamy cheeses and luscious, colourful desserts. The midday meal lasts for four hours, so take your time to savour everything your heart desires.

A la carte samplings

Besides the buffet, customers at the Sunday lunch can also order an a la carte sampling of plated specialities that include some of Shook!’s familiar signatures – pan-seared scallops with green pea puree, cod fish with potato and curry veloute, beef cheeks with mashed potatoes, tortellini with wild mushrooms, steamed sea bass with bean sauce, stir-fried ‘dancing prawns’ with hot mayo and honey-glazed walnuts, fried rice with chicken, grilled tenderloin with polenta and peppercorn sauce, and more.

Sunday lunches clock in at RM298 nett with a limitless flow of Moët and Chandon champagne, or RM188 nett for food only and RM94 nett for children.

Father’s Day cocktails

For the Father’s Day event, Shook! teamed up with Broker’s London Dry Gin to create a special selection of hand-crafted gin-based cocktails – Frisky Brit (Broker’s Gin, tonic, a splash of 7-up, fresh cucumber), Broker’s Promise (Broker’s Gin, cranberry juice, 7-up), Winston Churchill Martini (Broker’s Gin shaken over ice and served with a twist of lime) and John Collins (Broker’s Gin, lemon juice, sugar syrup, soda water).

A roving mime and magician (with an excellent bending fork performance) kept everyone’s spirits high throughout the session. Many thanks to Shook! for having us here.’