Launched earlier this year, The Dimsum Room in Mumbai has been making waves in the city for its elaborate menu of 40 kinds of handmade dim sums. It sits in the same 100-year-old building as its sister restaurant, HyLo in Kala Ghoda. However, it has garnered some negative attention on social media. A couple, Tarun Nathani and Richha, alleged that the restaurant served them pork despite knowing they were vegan and vegetarian, respectively.
The Dimsum Room Receives Flak For Serving Pork To Veg/Vegan Duo
Taking to their Instagram handles, Tarun Nathani (tarun.nathani) and Richha (justreethingss) shared a post “cancelling” the restaurant for “serving pork to vegetarians/vegans”. The couple tagged the official handles of The Dimsum Room, FSSAI and Department of Consumer Affairs to raise attention on the issue.
In a series of videos shared, the couple said they visited The Dimsum Room last week. As Tarun had visited the Kala Ghoda spot earlier, he called the manager before they arrived and informed him about their dietary preferences. The manager informed them that à la carte wasn’t available as the restaurant was running a brunch menu. However, he sent them the brunch menu, marking ‘V’ next to vegan options.
Couple Alleges Staff Tried To Convince Them It Wasn’t Meat
Tarun says in the video that he is a vegan, for spiritual and religious reasons, after seeing the brunch menu, gained the confidence to dine at the popular eatery. After being mistakenly served pork at the restaurant, Tarun alleges that the restaurant tried to cover up. He claims the staff tried to convince him and Richha that what they ate wasn’t meat, but a special vegetarian dish.
“It’s horrible. Hospitality businesses should put customer safety first,” he said. In the post, the duo mentioned that they weren’t the only ones who had to deal with this ordeal. Reading through old reviews of the restaurant, Richha and Tarun discovered that other vegetarian/vegan customers were also mistakenly served meat, with the staff refusing to take accountability for their actions.
Some reviews on Zomato show customers being disappointed with not just the meat put on their table, but the callous response by the team. The couple stated in their post, “Businesses should be accountable. Not everything is a transaction, I believe. Religious and spiritual sentiments are very real, and people spend years practising beliefs. Someone’s carelessness should not come and break it in a jiffy.” They ended the post by stating, “It’s sadder than it sounds and deeper than it looks.”
Restaurant Responds…
When Curly Tales reached out to the team of The Dimsum Room, here’s what they stated to us:
“At The Dimsum Room, we aim to hold ourselves to the highest standards of hospitality, food integrity, and guest care. We acknowledge that no establishment is beyond human error, but when lapses occur, we take swift and decisive action and strive to collaborate and resolve concerns with mutually acceptable solutions. In this specific case, basis our internal investigation, we would like to clarify that no non-vegetarian dish was served.
With an open line of communication and acknowledging the concern presented, we took immediate corrective action, including a thorough internal investigation and staff suspension. Unfortunately, what followed was not a good-faith effort to resolve a concern, but an orchestrated attempt to misrepresent facts, shift /manipulate narratives, and demand reparations under the implied threat of reputational harm – a form of harassment we cannot condone.
As an organisation, with earnest intent, we have continued to have an open stream of communication and acted transparently throughout, offering collaborative gestures that were unfortunately met with exploitation and conscious defamation, not engagement.We stand by our protocols and the findings of our investigation.
Legal action has now become prudent to protect our integrity and the brand we are tirelessly building earnestly and with dedication. We share this to address the growing misuse of digital influence for personal gain. We remain open to honest feedback – but cannot not yield to intimidation and pressure tactics which seem to have become a norm, over time, owing to establishments yielding and letting such incidents slide.”
For more updates on this story, stay tuned.
Cover Image Courtesy: @tarun.nathani/ Instagram and Canva Pro/ joesayhello (Representative Image)
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