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2013-08-11
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Date night on a Tuesday. I booked way in advance to ensure a table. The ambience was nice - dark wood, lots of pottery on display, decent-sized tables that were well spaced apart, and scaffolding outside the window. Which isn't too bad, considering all you're looking at is the back of yet another building in this concrete jungle, you're not missing out on much.The pisco list reads like a juice bar menu with lots of fruity flavours. I debated between the classic pisco sour and the Mayta and went
The pisco list reads like a juice bar menu with lots of fruity flavours. I debated between the classic pisco sour and the Mayta and went for the latter, thinking I can probably knock back another one throughout the course of an evening. But it turned out to be a rather big portion and lasted me all the way, leaving little room for a second one. For $68 it was a pretty good deal.
The food was well prepared with fresh ingredients, nicely presented and quite modestly priced. We had a Solterito salad which was a light and refreshing dish of quinoa, cured salmon, fava beans, avocado cream, and miso dressing (which was slightly overpowered by the avocado). The chicken and beef skewers were well seasoned and each had a wonderful drizzle of sauce on it, but the beef had some stringy fibres which I couldn't chew through. The trio ceviche of salmon, tuna and seabass came in three delicately decorated glasses that showed attention to detail, and the different condiments complimented each fish well.
For mains we ordered the duck leg confit with beer cilantro rice, and the veal cheek stew. They must have use a pretty big duck as the size of that confit leg looked like it came a goose. The confit had a thin crispy skin and the meat was very tender and moist, but the duck breast pieces paled in comparison as it lacked seasoning. The rice was a little stodgy and I couldn't taste much beer in it. The two "infant" baby carrots seemed to huddle in the corner fearing the towering duck leg, looking a bit forlorn and forsaken. I don't think anyone would have missed the baby carrot as it looked more like a garnish than an ingredient worth mentioning in the menu. The veal cheek so tender it was that it melted in my mouth, absolutely divine. However I wasn't too taken by the sourness of the dish, and some of the vegetables even tasted pickled. I had expected a powerful red wine sauce rather than a watered-down, yellowy sauce. Actually the sourness reminded me of Burmese dishes. To be fair, it wasn't bad, just what not I had expected from reading the menu.
One ubiquitous ingredient in EVERY dish, though not always mentioned, is the Peruvian corn Choclo. It's much bigger than your average corn kernel, a bit nuttier, less sweet and chewier. It was interesting to try it in the first couple of dishes, but when it rears its head in every dish you feel the chef might have an obsessive habit of peppering everything with it, and then it gets boring. But I did learn a lot about the new ingredients used in Peruvian cuisine and it was an educational trip.The staff were friendly and polite enough, the only comment would be the overly-efficient removal of plates. I had barely placed my knife and fork on my plate when the waitress came up to take it away, even though my husband was still eating. It's a small point, but it feels like I'm being asked to wrap up and go. It's not that hard to wait till everyone at the table has finished before clearing up. Also, the waitress felt compelled to rearrange our glasses of water and drinks, the candle, and whatever else on the table each time she came around to serve a plate, which I found unnecessary.
张贴
