Designer Dining in Dubai

We were in Dubai again weekend before last (yes, we are rather jammy and spoiled) and once more we tended to hang around the Burj Khalifa. This time we even stayed in The Palace hotel (which is one of The Addresses) which is next to the Souk al Bahr and where Asado is situated.

On our first night we were taken to the Cavalli Club for dinner.

Having been completely oblivious to its existence before that Thursday night, and also having been told it was the “Cavalli Café”, I did not expect to be greeted with a red carpet and white-clad bouncers behind the velvet rope at the back of the Fairmont on the Sheikh Zayed Road.

We had to ascend a completely closed and close black velvet lined stairway, lit only by pin-points and purple strips along the stairs, that felt like an ostentatious birth canal before we emerged into the club. The main floor was taken up, predominantly, by dining tables of varying size with “coffee” tables interspersed among them for people early enough to nab one but not dining.

Huge great swathes of Swarovski crystals on string dangled from the walls like really extravagant net curtains, hanging between and around the larger dining tables around the edge of the room and also surrounding the numerous chandeliers which looked very much like oddly shaped upside down salt shakers wrapped in strands of yet more crystals.

The dominant colours of the room are black, purple and zebra, with flashes of white and gold. It is just so unashamedly and hilariously bling that it is difficult to be offended by the tackiness, while at the same time difficult to miss the fact that it is very, very tacky. I spotted at least two bars, one of which was surrounded with varyingly sized bottles of Roberto Cavalli vodka – the grains for which, I have no doubt, Mr. Cavalli harvests himself by the light of the moon and keeping only thoughts of beautiful women in mind while he does so.

All pretentiousness aside (and there was A LOT to set aside) the Cavalli Club is a surprisingly good restaurant. The atmosphere is all about the fun and fabulous but it feels neither too predatory nor too bitchy and the music is spot on. Our reservation was for 10 which, for a dinner club, is a dangerous time if you are hoping to be able to hold a conversation with your companion(s) but the DJ kept the volume just right so that the diners could converse while still feeling a club-vibe. From sometime around 11:30/midnight the volume slowly but steadily increased until the venue was definitely more club than dinner, but the raising in volume was so gradual that we didn’t really notice until we found it difficult to hear the person next to us, and by then we had all finished and were ready to leave anyway. Aside from a terribly bourgeois moment when the “sommelier” got lambasted for not knowing what was in a dish (I don’t know because I’m the sommelier. “But if you don’t know what’s in the dish how can you recommend a wine to go with it?” I can recommend based on if it’s a light meal or heavy, if you are having meat or fish or chicken. “So, basically, you can tell me that red goes best with steak and white goes best with fish?” Yes. Maitre D' – “He’s new.”) the service was fab. Efficient, quick but not rushed and patient. We were a party of seven and the waiter did not even look vaguely irritated when a number of us changed our order a couple of times.

So! On to the food. The food was very good. Really. I was impressed. Unfortunately I can’t remember what everyone else had (not even O! For shame, for shame!) but almost the whole table had the same main dish.

The prequel was an amuse bouche. A rather blah, teeny, round, cheese and potato croquette, served with a smudge of marinara sauce. It did not forecast the meal to come in any way, being somewhat uninspired and flavourless.

I started with tuna tartare that was served on a chunky olive tepanade and topped with very white crab meat. It was served with bitter green leaves dressed in a very subtle truffle oil which managed to enhance every other flavour in the plate and hold it’s own at the same time but at no point was it overpowering. What a clever little truffle oil! It came with a bread lance (to call it a “stick” would be far too modest) speckled with white and black sesame seeds which was a welcome bit of crunch to a largely smooshy dish.

The main was quite simply divine. A “mille fuille” (yes, really) of beef tenderloin and garlic sauteed spinach, topped with a fat but dainty slab of pan fried foie gras. Though I asked for the beef to be medium-rare (as is my wont) the layers were made up of such thin pieces of meat that it was impossible for it to be anything but cooked through. It didn’t matter though, the tenderloin was – indeed – tender and soft. The foie gras was lovely, a gorgeous addition and the richness of it was counterbalanced by the assertively salted baby carrots and asparagus that graced the plate along with some very nice sliced and griddled new potatoes. As is so often the case, it was a bit part on the plate which made the show: the garlic spinach was so subtle but so integral that it would have been the element that I didn’t know was missing, had it not been there. It all worked so wonderfully together and each element was able to stand alone. The accompanying sauce was nice and savoury, I would have said it was a red-wine reduction had we been in any other country, and I didn’t want to ask the long-suffering waiter after he’d been so considerate to our table already. Perhaps it was juniper berries…?

For the sweet, a few deserts were ordered and did the rounds of the table. Being so stuffed and satisfied after my main I was reluctant to indulge (I know! ME!!) but I did try some of Os caramel tiramisu, which worked well when you tried to escape from it being a tiramisu. Very creamy but not too heavy, nice caramel and dense spongey bits, the coffee in the form of a scoop of real coffee ice-cream nestling on top of the glass the tiramisu was served in. Other deserts were an exotic fruit platter (which I didn’t bother with though it looked very pretty) and a selection plate with a fantastic almond ice-cream and an oozy chocolate fondante.

We took the fur-lined lift down to street level on the way out at about 1 in the morning as the club was just heating up. Absolutely a place to see and be seen, but with the right people and for the right reasons I would love to go again, have dinner and stay for the festivities into the night.


The next day, instead of relaxing and hanging out within walking distance where much entertainment could be had by all, we piled into our cars and drove out to Atlantis. Sited at the epicentre of the outer-rim of Dubai Palm, in order to reach it you have to drive up the trunk of the palm, past roads leading off to the “fronds” and a multitude of identikit apartment-blocks-that-kinda-look-like-hotels which brings to mind Barrett Homes: the Dubai model. Turning a bit of a corner and Atlantis appears, shouldering itself up to the sky, in all it’s pink and green “glory” it looks somehow embarrassed to be there. With more than a whiff of Disney-does-Arabia already present, Atlantis somehow made me think of those poor souls who dress up in the character outfits at EuroDisney for the little kids whose dreams of the real Disneyland were only recently crushed and who stare, distinctly unimpressed, while they cavort and jape in the rain.

We ate in Rostang, (allegedly) a traditional French brasserie from two-star Michelin Chef Michel Rostang. Looking back, I wonder how often Monsieur Rostang ventured to his namesake restaurant, particularly at lunch time. The entire meal was a farce, from start to finish. Having arrived behind the rest of our party we had to ask for menus and call the waiter over to order our drinks. To be fair, we were seven people dining, some having starters, some not, ordering drinks and, I dunno, FOOD. I know that can be a little confusing. However, this is a restaurant under the name of a two-star Michelin chef, I would expect the staff to have had a wee bit of training and to know that neither a croque monsieur nor a club sandwich count as “starters”. Oh yes. These two sandwiches came out with the starters, along with one wrong starter and one missing starter (can you say a missing starter was brought out? Probably not, let’s just move along swiftly, shall we? Good-o). After a bit of disagreement with the waiter who kept trying to assure us that sandwiches are starters and whose only response to my question of what does one have as a main course following a sandwich starter was to keep offering to bring me the menu, the sandwiches (which came with chips!!) were taken away and the Maitre D' came over. We explained the wrong starter and he went off again. Came back with the correct one and then asked if everything else was fine. No, we are also missing another starter. The first course took about an hour. By this point I was ravenous and very much looking forward to my wild mushroom fricassee with penne pasta in a creamy sauce. Wild mushrooms my arse. The pasta was that quick-cook rubbish that has the texture of old crumbly rubbers and the creamy sauce was cream that had been heated through with a bit of onion in. The limit was reached when O found something that looked like an ex-winged beastie in his salad. On closer inspection it appeared to be some salad roots or something, but it showed that the garnish hadn’t been washed properly and, for me, enough was enough. I couldn’t eat any more after that – and I’m not a particularly fussy eater when it comes to unexpected items in my food. The Maitre D' was summoned again and we complained about the whole sorry show. I would absolutely NOT recommend eating at Rostang which is a real shame because it is a lovely looking restaurant, a breath of authenticity in the wholly cynical church of tourism that is Atlantis.

The rest of the weekend, by turns, passed slowly and quickly with good and bad food (notably another fantastic meal at Asado, how spoiled am I?, and a really disappointing brunch at More) and the impulse purchase of a pair of canary yellow roller-blades because they were half off and I felt tubby after a weekend of eating.

I felt a press of sadness walking past the McQueen shop and perused the shoes, bags and jewellery in Chanel before it was time to pack up the car and head back to real life in Abu Dhabi.

A weekend in Dubai

Times have been a little stressful recently at Foreigner Towers recently.

It’s complicated, and boring unless you’re in the middle of it, but there was a period of about three months where O and I weren’t sure if we were going to be able to stay in Abu Dhabi or if we were going to be told to pack-up and ship-out without too much warning. I should clarify at this point that the push would come from work sources and no other.

To be waiting, powerlessly, to hear a final decision that is always promised tomorrow but never comes leads to a great deal of tension and I, for one, felt an awful lot of anger.

The decision finally came. It wasn’t the one we hoped for, so there is still a lot of anger on my part, but at least we are no longer living with a weight dangling over our heads. And we are staying, which is brilliant.

After such a stressful time, O and I needed a bit of a break from it all, so he booked us into a hotel and we spent the weekend before last in Dubai.

It was just the two of us, we needed a little time just with each other, and we had a simple plan: Check out the Dubai Mall. Conveniently, there is a lot to do in and around Dubai Mall so we were well entertained. The Burj Khalifa (nee Dubai) elegantly dominates the surroundings, which includes a handful of hotels, the Souk Al Bahr (one of the new-old “souks” that seem to be cropping up everywhere) and a waterway out of which a fabulous water-show is propelled every evening after the sun goes down.

Having driven up on Thursday night we were able to get an early-ish start on Friday. Early enough for brunch anyway. There are a myriad of places to eat in Dubai Mall and unfortunately we decided to have dim sum at Ping Pong. I’ve heard less than amazing things about Ping Pong in the UK, and the branch in Dubai lived up to the low reputation. The service shuttled from obnoxious to surly and from non-existent to intrusive. The food was strictly ok.

After eating we strolled around outside, enjoying the sun and the water and the view of the Burj before taking the plunge and entering the mecca of consumerism that is the Dubai Mall.

What is so good about this particular mall is not only the size (which is immense) but the organisation. After you have solved the mystery of the dual floor-numbering system for the mall and car park (FAR more complicated than anything in this world needs to be, brain surgery has to be easier) and are able to actually get in to the mall it is particularly easy to find your way around and find what you’re looking for. All of the high end designer shops are in one section, the accessories are in another. Jewellery has its own area, as does electronics, and near by is the book shop of wonder – Kinokuniya. A Japanese book shop it is the largest I have come across in the UAE and, so far, the best anywhere. So well organised, and intuitively so, it was a joy to browse and I can only imagine that if you are after something specific it will be easy to find. While there is a food court, there are far more interesting places to eat or stop for a coffee dotted around and amongst the shops.

Needless to say, we killed a lot of time there.

After resting our weary legs for only a short hour back at the hotel, we donned our gladrags and headed out for dinner at Asado in The Palace hotel. An Argentinean restaurant, it gets its name from the open fire that the speciality is cooked over. That speciality? Spit roast baby goat. There was really no option for me and I had to have the goat, while O went for a steak. The steak was good, but the goat was amazing. We’d ordered sides but barely touched them and I whole heartedly recommend the empanadas for a starter, O had a beef and onion one that tasted like the most perfect Cornish pasty in the world. We were both too full for desert.

It was still early so we headed around the Souk and across the bridge to one of the Arabic restaurant/cafes that had a lot of pleasantly cramped seating outside the ground floor of the mall for coffee and shisha, both very nice. While we were there we were able to get a much better view of the fountain display.

There is a very shallow waterway separating the Burj Khalifa from the mall, souk and hotels. Once the sun goes down the water show begins! Every 20 minutes or so there is a flurry of water shooting up into the air in a delightful manner, accompanied by some rhythmically and atmospherically appropriate music. Every hour or so there is an extra long, extra delightful show and everything stops for a short while to watch.

Having had our fill of watching water being projectiled into the atmosphere, we moseyed back over to the souk and settled on Karma Kafe (yes, I absolutely HATE the name being spelled that way) for a couple of beverages, primarily because is by the same people as Buddha Bar. It was nice, the music a little on the loud side though and appeared to be mostly geared up for eating. The décor was fun in that red Zen way but the best bit was, just as we were deciding to go, the floor show started!

There was a buzz of activity behind the bar and then the music was cranked up even higher while the bar staff indulged in a little fire play for the benefit of the customers still remaining. There was the spinning and throwing (and dropping) of Molotov cocktails, fire breathing and a little touch of fire poi. All good fun, though I fear the performers needed a lot more practice since O and I slipped off our bar stools and took a couple of steps back to a slightly safer distance!

Brunch on Saturday morning and another brief spin around the mall (where I may or may not have finally maxed out my credit card) before we headed back to Abu Dhabi and reality.

It was a lovely weekend. I had a great time exploring a part of Dubai that I didn’t know at all before, and shopping is always fun.

Dubai is a fun city to visit, but for me, I wouldn’t want to live there. While I’m not a restrictivist, there seems to be a distinct air of Anything Goes in Dubai, which I can’t really get behind. Without going into specifics, there were a few moments when O and I looked at each other and said “you wouldn’t see that in Abu Dhabi” and I certainly felt glad of it.

Dubai moves a lot faster, is a lot more hedonistic and has a lot more westerners. Which is fine, absolutely, but I’m so glad that I live in Abu Dhabi.

Steak a la Marco Pierre White

A couple of days ago, O and I went to the Marco Pierre White steakhouse for the second time. The first visit was my birthday treat and this last one was (as far as I’m concerned) to celebrate a couple of very cool people moving to Abu Dhabi.


The restaurant is snuggled away in the gorgeous new Fairmont hotel (Bab Al Bahr) which sits next door to the Souq at Qaryat Al Beri (which is, in turn, next to and linked to the Shangri La). An unassuming entrance leads into a dining room that is casual, but definitely trying very hard to be so. Tables are roomy (apart from in the smoking section, although that is right by a window looking in to the kitchen so smokers aren’t treated like total pariahs) and not laden with silver, flat or glass wear and the additional decoration (small flower arrangement and a candle) are removed after ordering to make way for the freshly baked bread. Crisp white linen always works, but unfortunately I can’t say the same for the huge ostrich leather chairs which are not as comfy as they look and have arm rests too high to fit under the table.

But all that is trifling really. The service is excellent (friendly and not too formal) and only just briefly touched on overbearing on our first visit – I put this down to the restaurant being fairly empty for a Friday night – perfect on our second visit, they only have one sitting so once you book the table is yours for the whole night and the food is superb!

After ordering they serve delicious bread, of three different flavours baked into one loaf – cheddar and rosemary, mustard and onion. These come with salted, tomato and fig and date butters. It is very difficult not to fill up on the bread.

On our first visit I had duck foie gras served with caramelised pears and warm raisins while O had a warm salad of jumbo asparagus, fresh crab meat and a perfectly poached egg. I’m not normally a fan of fruit with savoury food, but the pears and even the raisins (a real no no for me) were the ideal accompaniment to the foie gras and counteracted the richness of the duck liver with a helping hand from some spiced salt served on the raisins. O’s dish was absolutely delicious. We both knew that asparagus and runny egg is a magic combination, the addition of the crab worked so well providing extra flavour and texture without removing anything from the other, more established, ingredients.

For the second course there was no question of what to have. It had to be steak. It had to be fillet and it had to be medium-rare. That’s not to say there aren’t other delightful options on the menu, if a slab of cow isn’t really your thing. There is a nice choice of fish which all sound delicious, not to mention rosemary baby chicken and a mustard encrusted rack of lamb. But! As I said, on this first visit there was absolutely no question. We ordered dauphinoise gratin, garlic mushroom and more asparagus for the side dishes and we both had the truffle cream sauce.

My steak came perfectly cooked, while O’s was a little over done. It was dealt with speedily and with subtlety, and we didn’t have to wait long until the second – better – steak was brought out. Since O had already dished out some of the sides and the sauce, we were provided with full portions of these (but not the spuds – sadly) as well. It was all phenomenal.

The deserts at this MPW are all terribly English. Off the top of my head there is bread and butter pudding, chocolate fudge cake, treacle tart, an English cheese plate and sticky toffee pudding. I seem to remember there being some kind of burnt cream thing as well, but I can’t remember exactly what it is.

I’m sure it will come as no surprise to anyone that I ordered the chocolate fudge cake. O went for the treacle tart.

While the savoury courses are portioned well, the deserts are huge. Definitely share portions. I was able to manage half… just.


On our second visit I started with potted duck. I’m generally a fan of potted meats (although since that’s such an un-appetising term I’ll stick to rillets) as long as they are done well I was exciting to try it with duck. It was ok, but not spectacular. I felt it was under-seasoned, it definitely lacked… something, but since I’m not a chef (and so probably shouldn’t comment on seasoning or much of anything) I couldn’t really tell you what that was. It was accompanied by a lovely thick marmalade which cut through the fatty-ness delightfully. O had the crab, asparagus and egg dish again and since O is the kind of person who prefers to try everything on the menu rather than stick with something he knows is good – that should really tell you something about how fantastic this starter is.

For the second course, I was very tempted to try the rosemary roast baby chicken but I stuck with what I knew was superb and had the fillet medium-rare again, with the same truffle cream sauce. O went for the rack of lamb and it was wonderful. The lamb was perfectly cooked and the crust had just the right amount of heat to enhance the flavour of the lamb without detracting or distracting in any way from it. Sides were gratin dauphinoise, triple cooked chips (not my cup of tea with steak, much prefer soft potatoes), spinach and mushrooms.

This time, O and I shared the sticky toffee pudding which was light but gluey in the way steamed puddings should be, subtle and not too sweet. Delightful.


I have to say that I think MPW is my new favourite steak restaurant. The food really is lovely, though I don’t know if the price tag is entirely justified. We are able to get a fabulous discount at another, excellent, steak restaurant that is closer to us in town which will remain our regular. That said though, I’m already thinking about when we can go to MPW again – I’m going to have the Eton Mess for dessert.