naihar food blog

Who knew it was so easy to feel like we were in Pariee?

Note: I was invited to a complimentary meal at fournil de PIERRE, with no obligation for a review.

My absolute first thought on entering fournil de PIERRE last week, inhaling the aroma of a combination of freshly baked bread and freshly ground pepper (oh my) was that my grandfather, an avid bread fan — his last trip to Dubai was spent eating LPQ bread for breakfast every day — would have absolutely loved the place!

Indeed, the place seems to have it just right. Its ambience, fragrance and decor transported us away from the Dubai hustle and bustle to a place where fresh bread, delicious soups and pastries can be had multiple times a day without any effect to your waistline. The influence was completed by French music playing away above us, and an extremely smiling wait staff. I think I'd have melted if they spoke to me with a French accent, but alas, that wasn't to happen.

The menu is diverse, covering soups, salads, sandwiches, pizzas, pastries, you know the drill. I can confirm that the French Onion soup is the best I've ever had, served in a lovely crusty bread and I absolutely need to go back for a sandwich that had some combination of organic bread, green apples and goat cheese. 

I was also pleasantly surprised by a mocktail — peach puree, pineapple and...spinach. I only agreed to try it out of utter curiosity — a spinach and peach drink? — and I learnt that it was not just possible but that spinach, when added subtly can enhance a peach puree brilliantly. We concluded that the chef clearly knows his combinations. Worth a try.

A visit to a patisserie cannot be complete without dessert. The chef's recommended strawberry cheesecake was extremely fresh, and different compared to the usual American cheesecake varieties I'm used to. And the little star was the White Forest, baked with a hint of pineapple.

All in all, it was a lovely getaway, and thankfully not inside a mall. I'm not sure how they'd handle being packed to the brim, but if it was anything like the other night, you can safely bet I'll be in that crowd.

Check 'em out, mes ami(e)s. You won't be disappointed.

*Yes, I know it's spelt Paris, but I spelt it out phonetically for better effect. It sounds even better if you add a few more e's to the end. Try it. Really.

fournil de PIERRE

StandPoint Residences, Downtown Dubai. Somewhat opposite The Pavilion, near Reem Al Bawadi.

After fresh orange juices, a taco salad and Cajun chicken platter with buttered corn i must say we did have quite a celebration.

Then again, maybe that walk down to Chillis might have been worth it!

Three to try: Rosy orange juice- for those who like to mix sweet and tangy flavors

Buffalo chicken salad- do ask them to go light on the sauce if you cant take the fire

The Cheesecake Factory, Dubai

Travel o food chaat of Delhi

Posted from: Al Mankhool Road - Dubai - United Arab Emirates

As I was about to say, throw me a lightly charred pie from a wood-fired brick oven, that cooks in 3 minutes and I’ll be your fan for life. It’s what defines a real pizza for me. I’ll typically take a look at a picture (or the real thing) and almost instinctively decide whether I’ll like the pizza or not. I had searched frantically for a shot when Jamie’s Italian introduced pizzas at their Dubai outlet a few months ago before I agreed to try them out. Speaking of which, I need to blog about that experience soon eventually.

So it was little surprise that Foodiva’s post about Rossovivo caught my eye. The review was definitely positive and the pictures got me excited. Could it be, could it? Alas, I had to hold my hopes when the dinner being organized there a few weeks ago was moved after the guest list expanded to a size beyond Rossovivo’s current capacity.

But let it be known that I pestered incessantly waited patiently until another visit was scheduled last weekend. And while I want to let the pictures speak for themselves, we all know that’s not really going to happen.

Pic 1: The Bufalina. A thing of beautiy. I wish I’d realized that the menu was not out of the shot enough, but this is where you thank me for revealing 87.5% of the delivery number before the end. Pic 2: The Raffaele. Who knew pistachio on a pizza could work? Pic 3: The Marinara 

The star of the show — for me, anyway — was the Bufalina: Buffalo cheese, tomato, basil. You could taste the difference in the quality of the cheese instantly and, coupled with the crust, it made for the perfect minimalist pizza I enjoy. I jumped at the tomato and garlic Marinara - my mind forgetting that it also meant there was no cheese on it - but the sauce was the right amount of fresh and tangy that I ate it all up anyway.

The surprise of the show — was the Raffaele: pizza with, wait for it, pistachio! Named after the Chef himself. Frankly I thought it was outright bizarre but I did try a little piece — we all live for bizarre, don’t we? — and I’ll admit the chef gets points for creativity. Pistachio and cheese do seem to go together despite my initial objections, and the women at the table absolutely loved it.

Love the fact that you can watch your pizzas being made at the table.

So finally, a pizza place I can rave about again. It helped that someone used me as a landmark with a taxi-driver to spot the place while I stood outside frantically calling everyone waiting quietly for everyone to arrive; nothing like an ego boost just before you’re treated to amazing buffalo cheese pizza.

Rossovivo

I don’t have a name for this yet but this is chicken, spinach and cheese (with a few other ingredients)- all baked.

Travel-o-food Delhi

The best thing about traveling is getting a chance to savor the local cuisine. The foodie in me plays a big role in deciding where to go on a holiday. And yes I do travel with a list of restaurants ready!

On a recent trip to India’s capital Delhi, I was of course blown away by the amount of good food available. So much so that I did manage to put on a few kilos, but it was much to my delight!

Pictured here is the ultimate chicken tikka from a traditional Indian roadside eatery- Rajinder da dhaba. The thing about these quintessential dhabas are although you might not like to sit there and eat, you cannot resist the amazing aromas each one carries. Rajinder Singh is known among the Green Park area residents for this scrumptious, succulent and perfectly spiced chicken tikka. Served in a little bowl made of dried leaves, with cool mint and yoghurt chutney on the side, his chicken morsels will melt in your mouth leaving behind an irresistible aftertaste of tandoori spices. Like so many other traditional eateries, this one started out as the eatery for taxi drivers, truckers and assorted transport people. Now though, you can sit in his air conditioned hall and enjoy.

Note: Having known Arva couple years now, our manakish discussions have always been interesting. So when I mentioned the falafel manakish a while ago, it just had to be tested. Who cares if it took 8 months to actually make the trip happen. I’m excited then, to bring you a joint foodie post - the first of its kind. Think of it like a special episode. 

Note 2: The word man’ousheh in our post is not some kind of auto-correct defect. It’s the singular of manakish in Arabic. Yes it is. No, it’s not right to say can I have a manakish with cheese. Yes, we know you’ve said it before, we have too. No, it’s never too late to change.

Chirag had told me about these falafel manakish in Karama. That’s like waving a bone in front of a dog, go fetch. I barked till he agreed to take me there.

I came across the falafel man’ousheh quite by accident – come to think of it, this is starting to ring true for a lot of really good food I find. The term they first used at Moulin D’Or when I walked in a few years ago during late night certification classes was: falafel sandwiches. But sandwich it was not. I watched their chef make what looked like a green topping man’ousheh wondering what he was up to, before I realized they really meant ‘falafel man’ousheh.’ I’d had falafel manousheh just once before in Abu Dhabi, where the guy tried to break open what I believe was a solitary falafel over labneh in a combination that, well, was clearly not worth blogging about.

Moulin D’Or however, put a nice spin on a traditional offering, spreading delicious falafel batter on a manousheh dough, topped with tahini, tomatoes, some greens and pickles. I can get aboard that train any day.

Me too…any day, ALL day. And if I’m hopping on any train, I’m taking both Chirag and Sheban—two outrageously smart, tech-wired entrepreneurs—with me, and making a food tour working session of it. Yeah I know, *everything* these days is about the food tours. I’ll launch it and then I’ll shut up already. Or maybe you’ll see promo SMS spam on food tours violently possess your cellphones. You can turn off the TV, turn off the radio, shut your eyes tight when you pass an annoying yellow bakeshop-plastered billboard, but cellphone…that’s where I’ve got you *right* where I want you, because Dubai has established that your cellphone is the one place you can never opt out of promo spam. It’s the Hotel California of ominous marketing spam, you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave…

But I will admit, when I stepped into Moulin D’Or, the food tours were the last thing on my mind. For someone whose Achilles heel lies in warm buttery baked goodies, this was heavenly hell. I walked in and it all just smacked me in the face: giant croissants puffed up like angry birds, small white discs of pastry smattered with za’atar and cheese, chocolate glazed rows of ganache and coffee buttercream-layered Opera cake, boats and crescents and all the usual shapes of tiny fatayer with cheese and meat and veggies. How had I not ever given Moulin D’Or a second glance on my visits across the street to Al Reef Bakery? Imagine, all those mornings where I could have been living the dream with HULK buttery croissants…

Seriously? You know you can get giant croissants anywhere right? It’s the falafel man’ousheh that’s a rare species around here. And to think we almost missed it that evening. When I walked up to Moulin D’Or’s manakish oven, my heart skipped a beat. I didn’t see the A4 printed sign in Calibri that used to read “Falafel Sandwich, 5 Dhs”. It would seem we were a couple months too late to make the trip, and the falafel man’ousheh had now morphed into a mainstream falafel sandwich, no frills. Dejected, we walked back to the table. I was devastated, Sheban looked sad but could potentially be won over with a meaty fatayer, but Arva? Arva hadn’t really accepted the tragic news at all. She just strolled right back to the counter, because one more attempt at sighting the falafel manousheh was *absolutely* necessary. Skipping over a comment relating to women, better service and the GCC, I will merely point out that the chef agreed to make a couple of manakish just for us.

I’m ashamed to admit that I do use my chubby womanly charm when it comes to food. That’s not a bad thing now, is it?

Considering how the evening had progressed, the manakish’s arrival to the table was that much more exciting. The consensus around the table was that it looked even better than expected (though I was just gobsmacked with hunger by this point to have any expectations at all). I was just glad our trip had not been in vain. Crisp manousheh dough, layered with awesome falafel mix, topped with tahina and crunch…a quiet calm engulfed the table as we ate (save for my incessant questions about food tours this and food tours that). Falafel makes for a very light man’ousheh when not fried, and although I felt that my memory of the manousheh I’d had here years ago was slightly better than the reality on my plate, this was still…

…satisfying. Of all the man’ousheh I’ve tried, the salty-bitter za’atar and cheese ones, the meaty sujuk ones, the creamy sweet lebneh ones, I’d say this falafel man’ousheh was the more subtle of the lot. The man’ousheh innards were so light that if you guzzled it down thoughtlessly, you wouldn’t hear the falafel spread murmur fragrantly from the crust. The base was thin and crispy, disintegrating into a crunch reminiscent of a stroll over dry autumn leaves in a city with four seasons. There was no cheese, and if there was tahina, it was barely there. The whole ensemble was delicate and understated.

The manakish must have been good, because we talked about falafels for about 20 minutes afterwards. Did you guys know there’s a falafel bar in Sharjah? NaaahsssSSSH! It’s a secret! …but more on that later. I can’t guarantee that Moulin D’Or will entertain more requests for the coveted man’ousheh, but having a woman in your party apparently helps. If not, they do have a decent repertoire of manakish to choose from.

And cheesy fatayer and angry bird croissants. Yumsies.

Moulin D’Or

Drive past Karama Post Office and you’ll see it on your right (before Options Furniture Building).  http://www.moulin-dor.com | +9714 3547847  

So when I was asked to check out Amerigos, I was excited - but I also didn’t look them up beforehand so I didn’t fully know what to expect. My previous experience in the Yas Marina Circuit was actually rather good; but taking your parents along when reviewing food can always be tricky, what with specific food preferences and them having to wait while I snap up pictures of life, the universe and everything.

Now for those of you who want the answer quickly, Amerigos passed!

To begin with, I was happily surprised by the atmosphere and setup. While it is part of the Park Inn by Radisson, Amerigos has a very casual and comfortable decor, a semi-outdoor setting, an indoor sports bar *and* a pool area. With the weather still holding up, the experience was enjoyable - this is a place that works for friends, family, a nice quiet evening or an after-work hours meet and greet.

Food wise, the menu has quite a bit to offer. The menu is modelled more on what I would call Tex-Mex rather than pure Mexican. The guacamole was wonderful and among the freshest I’ve had. The other surprise item - well, surprise because we added it on as an afterthough halfway through the maincourse - were the Fajitas. 

Trust me, their ‘stir-fry’, for want of a better word was so good, I just kept eating the mix without having the patience to actually roll up the fajitas.

Overall, the food was on well done & fresh. The chef seems to like keeping things simple - something that works very well for Amerigos.

We were a bit intrigued by something called Hojaldre de Vegetales which was a puff pastry filled with vegetables and an escabeche sauce. While there was nothing really wrong with it at all, it just didn’t feel very Mexican compared to everything else we had and enjoyed.

Since I’m sure those of you who got this far will want to know, I’m doing the smart thing and attachingthe dessert menu for your comfort. I went for the lime, mint & rum sorbet since I was looking for something light - and in hindsight, perhaps the rice pudding might have been more traditional option.

In the end, it boiled down to the usual two suspects - the food and the atmophere, and Amerigos does really well on both counts. There was a healthy crowd through the evening - people out with family and friends, and football fans enjoying the large screens at the bar. Amerigos makes a great choice if you’re up for a leisurely drive across the Circuit followed by a satisfying meal or if you happen to be in the area.

Amerigos Mexican Restaurant & Bar

The first (and only, thankfully) time that happened was when I visited Foul W Hummus a couple of weeks ago to sample and photograph their delicious hummus. Now that I think about it, I’m surprised it hasn’t more often considering my (borderline crazy) fascination with taking multiple shots of food at restaurants and eateries.

Right, let’s get the disclaimer out first: I love hummus. Part of my life’s mission involves hunting for decent hummus* - and don’t scoff, enough outlets get it wrong for me to include it in a mission statement. That’s how much I adore this awesome chickpea creation. So when I spotted a little outlet in Barsha named after it, I was intrigued enough.

Foul W Hummus is a fantastic testament to the ‘less is more’ philosophy. With a simple menu comprising three main items - Foul, Hummus & Falafel (and related variations) only, they may only do a few things, but they do them right.

This is particularly true when it comes to their hummus; the only word that comes to mind is addictive! They seem to have their proportions perfectly right - just enough creaminess and just enough tahini - to always leave us licking the edges of the containers every time we go. They also keep a constantly-on-the-stove container of boiled whole chickpeas to add that perfect warmth into each serving.

I’m a regular, as Mahmoud (who mans the entrance and phones) will assure you. Heck, I’ve even got cousins all the way in South America craving their hummus months after their last visit (during which, mind, we made 4 trips to the place in a week). We’re not the only ones either; stop by on a Friday morning and you’ll barely be able to stand in there - which will only make you glad they get their orders done quickly! 

Foul W Hummus does have other items on their menu - foul and falafels - both of which are good as well. I will admit I’ve had better falafels and foul elsewhere, but theirs is still among the fresher ones available around town. It’s just…their hummus is so enjoyable, the others pale a little in comparison. We’ve also tried their fatteh - which is yummy as well except it dries up quickly, so I don’t recommend getting it unless you’re eating it there, or in the car on your way home. (Edit: A subsequent visit indicated that they’ve solved that problem, so take it away!)

To top it all, the staff are incredibly friendly, smiling about in their nice blue tees - to the point where they started posing and pointing at things to make sure I covered it in my picture gallery.

Once we were done eating and I was satisfied with the pictures of the place itself, Chef Azizi walked out from the kitchen and insisted on showing us (and taking pictures of) their nerve center as he made falafels at the speed of light, the smile never leaving his face. A must visit!

*I live to eat. Sue me. Ok, don’t, but you know what I mean.

Festive breakfast

Another gem from Sri Lanka!

On Christmas day, our little boutique villa in Unawatuna, served us a festive breakfast. Along with the usual continental breakfast fanfare, we were surprised with a visually delightful dish. The little Christmas tree like savory parcels definitely brought a huge smile to our faces. Curried semolina, stir-fried with cashews, curry leaves, grated coconut, red chilies (similar to Indian upma) shaped like a tree and then layered with salty potato strings to hold onto the shape. The tree was then garnished with curry leaves and the top was adorned with a star made out of a carrot slice!

Not only was the dish interesting to look at, it was definitely simple and delicious and helped keep the hunger pangs at bay until our huge Christmas meal. I don’t think the dish has a name, or if it does – please give me a shout out.

What a Watalappan!

As we all know, Sri Lankan food is super delicious and super spicy. On my recent trip to Sri Lanka,a certain devilled dish sent my palate up in roars and of course I needed rescuing and well water, juice, bread etc. don’t help at all – at least in  my case. So the waiting staff brought me a simply but beautifully plated dish of 'spiced coconut custard' or Watalappan.

At first sight, it was a light, spongy textured piece of cake with a caramelized top, garnished with strawberries. On taking a spoonful, the Watalappan just melted in my mouth. Smooth, airy and creamy egg custard, with a rich coconut flavor, doused in nutmeg, cardamom and cinnamon and baked to perfection. The beautiful golden color is mainly attributed to Jaggery, which is used to sweeten, also gives the custard a distinct color and flavor.

Pastel de Tres Leches

On a lazy Friday afternoon, post lunch, what’s that one piece of food that can completely satisfy all your senses? Well most of us have a vague idea of what pleases us, after a coma-inducing meal, however for me it has, is and will always be the Tres Leches cake.

Tres Leches, which literally means ‘three milks’ in Spanish, is a light sponge, generously soaked in three different kinds of cow’s milk, baked to perfection ensuring no crust, dense yet light fluffy texture, with every bite screaming ‘just died and gone to heaven’.

If I’ve managed to make you salivate, you can definitely sink your teeth into this cake at Maria Bonita’s Taco shop on Umm Al Sheif road in Jumeirah.

I have been making cheesecakes yet again. This time I decided I would attempt to make a favourite of mine. Ferrero Rocher Cheesecake. This took some imagination and a little bit of research. I finally decided to alter a few recipes which I found to make my own.

Ingredients:

One box of Ferrero Rocher chocolates

One jar of Nutella

1 250g packet of Chocolate Digestive Biscuits

100g Butter, melted

1 Tub of Double Cream (300ml)

1 Tub of Cream Cheese (300g Philadelphia)

3 tablespoons of Icing Sugar

a handful of chopped roasted Hazelnuts (to decorate)

Method:

Line the cheesecake tin with baking parchment

Crush the digestive biscuits in a mixer and add the melted butter into the mixer. Pulse the mixture till combined.

Pour into the cheesecake tin and press down firmly

Whip a bit of the cream with the Philadelphia to soften and remove any lumps. 

Whip the rest of the cream in a separate bowl with the icing sugar

Add the softened Philadelphia to whipped cream and mix till just combined

Pour the combined cream cheese mixture into the cheesecake tin, smoothing down with a spatula or spoon.

Spread a layer of Nutella over the cream cheese mixture. 

Sprinkle on some roasted chopped hazelnuts

Add one whole Ferrero Rocher per slice of cheesecake. (usually 8/10 slices)

Top tips:

If you are making it in a cheesecake tin, line the tin with baking parchment

Grease the baking parchment with some butter to make it stick to the inside of the tin

You can make individual cheesecake pots (see picture above)

Press the digestive biscuit base down gently with a spoon or fingers if you like getting messy

Dipping the spoon/spatula in water helps the Nutella layer smooth out

Let there be 'cake'

The history of cake dates back to ancient times. According to the food historians, the ancient Egyptians were the first culture to show evidence of advanced baking skills. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the English word ‘cake’ back to the 13th century. According to food historians, the precursors of modern cakes (round ones with icing) were first baked in Europe sometime in the mid-17th century. It was not until the middle of the 19th century that cake as we know it today arrived on the scene and the birthday cake became an integral part of the birthday celebrations in Western cultures since the middle of the 19th century. With the development of culinary and confectionery advancement, what we have now is just a delectable masterpiece of  rich ingredients, combined to tantalize all senses.

Well, can you imagine a world without cake?

Wait, wait - can you imagine a birthday without cake?

No, never.