Sunday, March 02, 2008

One day at Graze

Accompanied the Insaneguptas for lunch one sunny Sunday. To salubriate [sic] Shro's happy birth anniversary a couple of days after the event. (Shro seen in pic on left with her papa, Pinaki.) In fact of point, the same Sunday following the all-nighter at Fireflies. It was tough waking up in Shro's Chamber of Death-Sleep only a few hours after we had crashed, esp after the previous night's revelries, but what the hey, we knew we had a good meal coming.
And what a meal!!! Va va vooom. For starters we went through the entire repertoire. Foie gras, oysters (with Asian sauce for me, with Bloody Marys for the rest of 'em), roast duck, and prawn tempura.
For the main course: lobster medallions for Shro's Gramma Deeds, grilled lobster for Pinaki, steaks for Aloka and Shro, and tiger prawns for me.

Here are the before-and-after pics of my lip-smacking tiger prawns, drizzled in olive oil, with cherry tomatoes and boiled asparagus and nice healthy greens for accompaniment.
Presented like so (Please note bottom of very clever two-in-one decanter for olive oil and vinegar above the plate):
Fifteen satisfying minutes later... BURP.
Must make mention of very impressive ginger and watermelon sorbet that we were served between the starters and main course. Fabulous. And I don't even like ginger.

The desserts... Rowr! Dark chocolate assiette, raspberry somesuch, crème brûlée, and I swear to God I don't remember what mine was except I loved it. It was a super fresh ice-cream accompanying a pudding thing with a berry underbelly. Here, have a look-see.Vaav. Whatte presentation.

Absolutely loved the polite, charming staff who served us during our meal. Granted there was hardly anyone else in the restaurant (what's with that?), but unlike the snooty and inefficient service one gets at the neighbouring Café Mozaic, this was lovely. The waiter serving us our drinks (fresh and refreshing fruity juices for Deeds and I, Sula wine for the rest of the lot) must have overheard us toasting Shro on her Happy Birthday. Quietly and without grinning meaningfully or otherwise making an ass of himself, he went backstage and started turning the wheels that work within the wheels. Superbly timed to mark the end of our dessert round, the staff nonchalantly wheeled in a rose-petalled trolley with a gorgeous chocolate cake and presented it to Shro with compliments from Graze. Awww... While we oohed and aaahed and cut the cake and stood around in a group looking busy, they took a pic and instantly framed and handed it over to us. Tears in our eyes and all that. So sweet.

So, in a word, if you have lots of money left over at the end of a week (or a year, if you earn like I do), head to Graze. Am very glad it won the 'Best European Restaurant' in Bangalore according to the Times Food Guide. Yes, it's steep. But it's also very worth it. Once a year.....

6 comments:

kinkminos said...

after that mouth-watering and highly detailed description, perhaps your post should have been titled GRAZE ANATOMY.

but then me and mrs. silly-titles... we kinda got a thang goin on, don't you know!

longblackveil said...

*green in face*
Vot, men, Kinky bhai...

kinkminos said...

sorry bibi, didn't mean to gross you out. like i said, i have a thing for smart-ass titles.

i just meant that you had gone into such detail (and i mean that in the best possible sense) that the title just sort of suggested itself. (at least, thank god, you didn't call the piece AMAZING GRAZE).

longblackveil said...

Aaaaiiieeeee..!@#@#??!@!!
Shaabaash. Keep going, bruddah.

Jellicles said...

clean plate except for the HEALTHY GREENS!

longblackveil said...

I promise you, darling Jellicles, that I relish leafy greens as much as any rabbit in th wild. I ate a lot of the stuff too, but Graze have nice, generous portions and I couldn't possible down the whole thing. Notice how the volume of greens has diminished drastically, how the asparagus is completely missing ad how the remnant cherry tomatoes have had their life-blood squished out of them. Yummm.
As far as poss,
The Saab attacks her greens with gusto;
But had I had more,
I would have busto-ed!
Haw haw.