food & photography
Warm fragrant spices, uplifting the mellowness of firm pears, encased in a crisp puff pastry is something which definitely celebrates autumn. Looks like, rains have completely drifted away now. Mornings and evenings have started becoming more pleasant and in fact even sun is not that harsh. It has started getting better day by day, with us now in September….
Cold winter nights are meant for having hot steaming soups in the dinner. A bowl of hot soup and some crusty bread to dunk in, while sitting under the cover of your cozy blanket is the most comfortable proposition that could possibly happen on a dreadful cold night. Most of the time I would resort to my mix vegetable soup, which is basically a mix vegetable soup with whatever there is leftover in the fridge. But sometimes during weekends when I have got enough time, I would rather splurge onto making something as fascinating as french onion soup. I had been wanting to make this soup, ever since I saw the recipe in Monsieur David Lebovitz’s My Paris Kitchen. The story behind him including the recipe of this french onion soup in his cookbook and the nostalgia behind this being long forgotten off the restaurant’s menus in the city made me feel like a traveller who is experiencing it at first hand. The kind of soup which has big slices of crusty baguette that are totally filled with the hot simmering broth and topped with lava-like cheese that forms a long stretching strings when you pull the spoon away from your mouth after each bite, is probably best suited to be enjoyed at home. And that makes it all the more comforting. I would love to gorge on such hearty meals in winters forever. It is just impractical to resist a steaming bowl of caramelized onions in a hearty broth.
French cuisine to me has been all about those amazing pastries, desserts like Crepe Suzette, delectable Macarons, yummy and crumbly pastries, mille feuille and everything that has got butter in it, loads and loads of butter. Probably, I have a strong affinity for the desserts and that is the reason, I wouldn’t go beyond classic French onion soup, Foie Gras and Salade Nicoise with a warm crusty baguette when it comes to ordering a main course and would rather save my appetite for the desserts. Because, I know desserts would never ever disappoint when it comes to French.
Until very recently, a dinner I had one of the finest ones in recent times changed my mind, when I got to introduced to a Riviera cuisine, an all new and different take on the classic french cuisine, which I knew about. Blogger’s Table, once again gathered for a dinner at La Riviera restaurant of this newly built property of Pullman Hotels at Central Park Gurgaon. Riviera cuisine, as introduced to us by Executive Chef Tanveer Kwatra, is basically a blend of food from Nice, Marseillaise regions of France and has modern interpretations with emphasis on fresh seafood and prime cuts of meat. It more strongly resembles to northern Italian food. Fresh produce like local olive oil, goat’s cheese, herbes de Provence are more commonly used.
It was quite refreshing as well as exciting to know about the Italian connect of the food, knowing that Italian is the cuisine I love the most. La Riviera at Pullman, tries to use as much as locally available fresh produce but imports most of it’s prime cuts and ribs from the coastal region in France. Chef also told us, that how creatively, natural organic and fresh ingredients have been of prime importance in the menu at the restaurant. It was interesting to know, that they have got techniques to extract colors from fruits and vegetables, such as chlorophyll from spinach for the green color.
These were some of the dishes which we were served that night.
Ciabatta with olive oil butter. Wow! I just fell in love with the olive butter, when I got to know that it has got no butter, but it hold the shape because of natural emulsifying agents added to olive oil, I couldn’t resist slathering my bread with a generous spoon of this amazing olive oil. A nice kick of olives in very first bite.
Then followed Smoked Tomato bruschetta with garlic chips. You could literally feel the smoky-ness in those freshly chopped tomatoes.
Second course had Seared scallops and prawns with pistachio puree and noilly prat fumet along with Pan fried ricotta gnocchi, with cauliflower puree and saffron vinaigrette. Gnocchi was to die for and so was the pistachio puree.
Then we were served a nice and vibrant macerated asparagus and ruby grapefruit salad with smoked curd. The mellowness of asparagus paired really well with the tangy smoked curd.
Porcini mushroom risotto, very well cooked with a proper chewy-ness of the rice and the creamy-ness of porcini mushrooms.
In next course, we were served Goats cheese tortelini with eggplant caviar. Tortellini could have been slightly well done, which I felt because personally I like my pasta to be cooked well. I am not the kind of al dente. I know, that would sound aweful to most Italians. But the eggplant caviar, I just polished off within few seconds, with eggplant being one of my favorite vegetables.
After the fifth course, we had our palette cleanser which was an orange sorbet. Strong tones of orange, it had that nice well balanced kick at the palette. I wouldn’t mind eating that as a dessert too. Infact, I almost felt that that this could have been the dessert {knowing that my stomach was full}.
So after the palette cleanser, came an array of three main course, which we all shared, as we all were full. We were served Twice cooked best end of lamb with textures of root vegetable, Roasted beef rib eye and braised cheek pithvier with onion soubise and Spinach pithivier with arrabiatta sauce. Lamb was perfectly done, and that is the only dish I remember from that course. Everything else was just over-powered by the tenderness and the juicy-ness of the lamb.
By this sixth course, I had no room left for the dessert and was hoping that we don’t get our dessert served. But then, it came. And it created the magic. Manjari chocolate cremeaux, raspberry and champagne jelly and ivory chocolate milk, basically chocolate pot de creme served with raspberry jelly, in simple words. But, the magic was all about the chocolate that went into. World’s finest Valrohna. Oh My God! Now how could I’ve resisted. It was polished to the last bit. Every single bite took me to some dreamy world. Such soul satisfying dessert!
It was a very nice and warm evening spent with all my foodie friends, with getting to know about the different take on classic French cuisine. La Riviera promises to serve some authentic coastal french cuisine and does this job remarkably well. Definitely, a place to visit when you want to spend a calm evening and enjoy the delicacies from the Riviera.
Other’s present on the table that night: