- Restaurants |
- Nightlife |
- Shopping |
- Coffee & Tea |
- All
Kulu
Category: Restaurants Asian Fusion Asian Fusion [Edit]
1296 Gladstone AveVictoria, BC V8T 1G6
(778) 430-5398
- Hours:
Mon-Thu 5 pm - 10 pm
Fri-Sat 5 pm - 11 pm
- Takes Reservations:
- No
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Price Range:
-
$$
- Delivery:
- No
- Take Away:
- Yes
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Outdoor Seating:
- Yes
- Wi-Fi:
- Free
- Alcohol:
- Beer & Wine Only
- Has TV:
- No
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- Yes
- Dogs Allowed:
- No
2 reviews for Kulu
2 reviews in English
-
Review from christine c.
Victoria, BC
2/20/2011 1 photo
To preface I would never normally dole out five gleaming stars from one take out experience. But I also never would have expected an Asian restaurant this incredible to crop up in my neighbourhood or Victoria for that matter. I'm dead serious people. This place is Guu good, but less tapas, more appies and mains.
They are in Lucy's old spot in Fernwood Square and when I popped in on a Saturday night only one table was occupied. This concerns me a little. I know they're fairly new, but the delicious and popular Lucy's couldn't survive so I'll have to keep my fingers (and toes) crossed that business picks up for Kulu. I think they can do it. For one thing they are doing something no one else in Victoria is doing and at an extremely reasonable price point.
My dinner this evening was the Unagi Cake. Sounds odd for sure. Basically it was a large piece of melt in your mouth unagi on top of avocado, tamago and rice, with shredded nori and sauce drizzled on top. There's only one other place in town that has unagi that fresh (Sen) so I was super excited to see my favourite eel done right.
The price was $15 and after glancing over the menu, the prices are comparable to any Thai joint (meaning less expensive than Japanese in this city). The food is considered Asian fusion and it seems very Japanese to me. The girl who rang me in was so sweet and as I walked past the lone table of four I overheard them mirroring my feeling.
For the love of something please go to Kulu. After one meal I don't know what I'd do without it.Listed in: Best Evaaaaaaa!!!! In VicCity
-
Review from Dustin D.
Victoria, BC
8/21/2011
I actually expected to give 5 stars and was close to giving 4, but for a number of reasons I can't say that I'm a fan... yet. That said this place easily has the potential to pull 5 stars.
I called on a Friday night and asked to make a reservation for 4 for Saturday. The employee's reply was "we don't take any reservations on Fridays or Saturdays". OK, that's fine, I asked what would be a good time to show up and not have to wait. We arrived Saturday early evening, walked into the restaurant, saw a number of tables open and I was pleased that we would be able to sit inside as I don't like dining in the direct sun when it's really hot out. The server greeted us and said "oh, do you have reservations?" I was a bit taken aback and replied that we were explicitly told the day before that they would not take reservations on weekends so no, we didn't have one. She said, "oh well all the tables in here are reserved, do you want to eat outside?". None too happy about all this, we still decided to go ahead. I ended up being forced to sit on a metal bench, no scratch that, a stack of 3 metal benches on top of each other that had a metal bar running down the middle and were unmovable so you can guess where my bottom and metal bar were forced to meet. Very uncomfortable.
The menu is short and seasonal, all the options sounded delicious. We ordered and a little while later the appies arrived... or should I say 3 of the appies arrived with one guest left waiting for clams. A few minutes pass and we're now left with the choice of letting our dishes get cold, or being rude and eating in front of someone who has not been served yet (she encouraged us to go ahead and eat and not let the food get ruined). Her appie didn't show up until 10 minutes or more later than ours. Not a very good business practice for a restaurant. The guest who ordered the clams hadn't had them much over 5 minutes and now suddenly the waitress brings out her entree.... first, while she's less than half way done her appie. *Sigh*. If you're looking to be a well respected restaurant, you just don't do that.
Most of the food was excellent. Pot stickers, bacon wrapped japanese mushrooms, the pork burger on rice disks, the basa dish looked spectacular, all the presentation was exceptional. My one food complaint was that the chicken dish I ordered had too much sauce and the sauce was so overly salty that it was hard to taste anything else in it. The chicken itself was cooked to absolute perfection however.
Finally to wrap it up, we'd been done for 10 minutes, server came out, topped our water, we said we were done now. 15+ minutes more pass and no return of either server, not to bring us our bill or ask if we want it. We finally gave up and went inside to the counter and asked if we could please pay. There were two servers and only 8 seatings, so I'm pretty confused as to why this would happen.
Mostly fantastic food but some pretty irritating issues with customer service on our trip. The food and pricing does merit a return visit though and I hope to write an update down the road.
Specialties
Kulu Restaurant's experienced chefs blend fresh, seasonal ingredients to populate their menu with a variety of Taiwanese-based offerings infused by Korean, Japanese, and Western flavours
