Unique and Unforgettable: Our Dining in the Dark Review

Last Updated on April 7, 2024 by Adam Watts

For my birthday, my better half took me to a surprise dinner where she didn’t have to look at me. This is our unforgettable dining in the dark review in Singapore.

We went to NOX – Dine in the Dark, which in case you can’t tell from the name, is an experience where you dine in the dark. They claim to be the most unique dining experience in Singapore, which after experiencing it, is probably fair.

Now, I now what you might be thinking. Oh, that sounds cute. Turn the lights down low and make it cozy and intimate, sounds great, but probably doesn’t need to be an entire blog post.

Let me enlighten you, poor naïve person. “The dark” in this case means more complete darkness than you’ve ever experienced. I thought my childhood bedroom was pretty dark when all the lights went out, but this was the darkest of dark things. Imagine an empty, square room. Now pick up a shade of paint called “darkest midnight” and coat all the walls. Now add a coat of “charcoal tar”. Now turn off the lights. Now close your eyes.

Now you’re getting there.

To help with the shock of it all, we first had a pre-dining prep with another couple. To set the scene, and since this was the only part of the place we were able to see, we were in the downstairs area sitting at a regular tall bar table. Here we are:

The host told us we would get three platters, starter, main, and dessert, with four small dishes on each. We should start from 6 o’clock and go clockwise from there to 9, 12, and 3 – so bottom, left, top, then right for those gen-Zers who don’t know what an analog clock is.

It was also suggested you hold the dish super close to your mouth to avoid slopping food all down your shirt, which is a fair suggestion since that’s often a challenge even in the brightest of places.

The dining area was upstairs and, as we’ve established, absolutely pitch black. Getting up the stairs was tricky, and also probably a lawsuit waiting to happen. Four us were set as a team, with a staff member leading the way, with hands on the shoulders of the person in front. Step by gradual step we fumbled and stumbled our way up the stairs, losing precious light with every centimeter.

Again, I want to emphasize that it was dark, which I put in bold so you know it’s emphasized.

Eventually, after what my brain helpfully concluded was a period somewhere between ten seconds and ten hours, we were introduced to our seat, our table, our cutlery, and our glass. We sat down and started fondling things, trying to establish some kind of grounding. We noticed we had a wall to one side, which was tremendously helpful in keeping a sense of direction.

A note on the decor. The walls were probably something standard and forgettable because why would they go to the effort of buying nice artwork, but it’s fun to think they were secretly messing with us by having Nazi memorabilia or animal heads or a thousand photos of creepy-looking babies watching over us. At least that’s what I’d do if I was in charge.

The Food Review at Dining in the Dark

We’ve covered the “dark” aspect of this dining in the dark experience, so now let’s do the dining portion.

For each course we had a drink pairing too (cocktails for me, wine for my better half), which became a further item on the table to contend with. I’d been suspecting plastic instead of glass in case of all the inevitable accidents, but in testament to human adaptability, we had no accidents (and no slopping down shirts), and around us as best we could tell, only one fork was dropped.

The food was an interesting selection and was mostly really tasty, with a few weird textures that I’m certain if I could’ve seen I would’ve prodded once and been like “nope”.

And thankfully this dining in the dark experience is not designed as an opportunity to trick people into eating things that are gross – no brussels sprouts and marmite sandwiches here. I won’t say what the food was for anyone likely to visit in the coming weeks (every few months they change the menu completely too), just know that I highly recommend!

Actually, I changed my mind. I will spoil the food. Here’s a picture of our main course:

(Heehee.)

And no, you can’t take photos at all – you have to put your phone and any other light-emitting object into a locker before you go to the dining area.

Guessing what we were eating was a fun exercise. This has the texture of duck, this is definitely cheese, this is some blob-like goo that is oozing into my mouth– oh wait it’s just ice cream.

At the end after we’d made our way back down to the lounge, we were told and shown pictures of what we ate, and a lot of them our guesses were pretty close, but some strong flavors, e.g. banana, we didn’t notice at all. Useless sense of smell and taste letting us down! You’re supposed to pick up the slack when we lose our sight!

We never found out what our drinks were though. Some of my cocktails were super weird, but they’ll have to remain a great mystery of the night, like exactly how many creepy baby photos were on the walls.

The staff are all visually impaired so the experience gave a greater appreciation into their every day lives. It was extremely disorienting to lose the sense of sight, losing the sense that arguably gives us the greatest feeling of control over our environment.

We became more comfortable as the meal went on – I don’t want to sound too cocky or anything, I’ll just say that by the end we were smoothly swapping drinks across the table and I knew exactly where my fork was at least 70% of the time – but as soon as it came time to leave, getting up, walking, and navigating stairs was a real problem. Physically yes, but also my sense of direction was completely out of whack. It felt like we left via a completely different direction to the way we came in, even though we definitely didn’t.

Ultimately, it was a very humbling and unforgettable dining in the dark experience. But I’m still not sure if my better half chose it because she thought it would be an amazing experience or she just didn’t want to look at me for a couple of hours. Like the wall decoration, I’ll never know.

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