Bar review: Caffe Nero, Almas Tower, JLT – Dubai

I needed to deposit some cash I had at home and was looking for the nearest Emirates NBD ATM machine. Luckily enough, I found one very close to where I was: Almas Tower in JLT. I know Almas tower and remembered that at the ground floor, very close to the ATM machines there is a Cafe Nero bar. I was slightly hungry and decided to stop at the cafe to enjoy a light meal.

Among the various sandwiches, salads and croissants available, I chose a turkey ham with cheese and mustard toast that looked light and tasty. I asked the waiter to make it warm and sat at my table.

The staff is very polite and attentive and the bar is one of the cleanest I have ever seen in Dubai, with a person continuously dusting and mopping the floor and cleaning tables and chairs. Few minutes later my toast came and was surprised in noticing the huge amount of melted cheese that was leaking from the sides of the supposedly-italian-panino.

I needed to cut it in half to handle it and the quantity of melted cheese coming out was ridiculously huge.

Cafe Nero Turkey and Cheese Sandwich is really good even though the amount of mustard cheese is excessive.

The taste was great. The mustard rich cheese was really yummy and perfectly combined with the turkey ham and the crunchy toasted bread. The only problem is that I had to eat the sandwich and then to clean the plate from the abnormal quantity of cheese that was left.

If you have a cheese passion, this is the right sandwich for you.

Restaurant Review: Tr!beca, JBR – Dubai

During the weekend, that here in Dubai falls on Friday and Saturday, we like to try different restaurants and places to get out of the usual routine. Last weekend we tried a relatively new restaurant called Tr!beca Kitchen and Bar in JA Ocean View Hotel, in JBR.

The restaurant is getting popular because it is an NYC-inspired farm-to-table restaurant that serves organic products and also a lounge bar to enjoy drinks with friends. The restaurant is nicely decorated with a mix of wooden and metal furniture to give the customers that cozy feeling that place your mind on the perfect mood to enjoy a nice evening either you are solo, a couple of a group of friends.

Tribeca Restaurant – photo from tribeca.ae website

The menu is alright with starters, salads, main courses (1 chicken option, 1 fish, 1 lamb, 1 beef option, eggs and halloumi just to make everybody happy), a Little Italy section and desserts. I opted for a Cajun Chicken and the others got a salad with quinoa, stewed lamb and salmon. As desserts, I shared a Tiramisu with my partner and our friends got a cheesecake with passion fruit jam or compote and almond crumble.

After 20 minutes, a waiter approached me informing that the Cajun Chicken wasn’t anymore served in the restaurant since they have recently switched to a honey grilled chicken with caramelized figs, cheese and rocket salad (aka rucola or Arugola). I was surprised that they required 20 minutes to process the order but in any case I accepted the switch since it seemed quite interesting the proposed substitution.

With our great surprise, the meal was ready and they served it immediately after my clearance. The question is: what if I had said No? They would have been forced to serve the meals to the others and let me wait for other 20 minutes? This time they have risked a little but they have rightly guessed the answer I provided.

Honey caramelized Chicken Breast with figs, cheese and rucola

The combination of flavors ad texture is excellent and the chicken was really tender. The only bad thing is that the chicken was really peppery and the decorative powder on the side of the plate was pepper as well. If you do not like spicy food, you might want to ask to have the chicken with little or no pepper. The portion is enough if you are not that hungry or if you had some appetizers before. If you are starving, the chicken alone will not fill your empty stomach also because it comes without bread or any other side dish that you have to order separately.

The desserts were really nice. The Tiramisu with Marsala  was really yummy and really close to the original one that my mom use to make. The steamed cheesecake was also superb as our friends confirmed.

We had a nice dinner and spent some enjoyable time together, however the restaurant is a bit pricey. I think it is because of the massive presence of organic ingredients, but the chicken breast was almost 150 AED (41 USD), definitely too expensive to go dine there more than once in a while.

Why and what is a weekday vegetarian?

I consider myself to be a normal person who eats everything available in supermarkets and/or restaurants with just a special care in selecting what I believe to be a healthy food, possibly from a well reputed (in terms of quality and social/environment impact) producer. I am not such a big fun of  sugary products such as soft drinks, cookies and cakes and I have always considered Fast Foods as synonymous of bad quality and unhealthy option and as such to be avoided.

My diet was based on cereals (bread, pasta), proteins sources (cheese, beef, pork, chicken and fish) and some portions of fruits and vegetables that are very good for health. I was as teenager a supporter of the red meat: tasty, juicy and on top of all, very healthy with that great content of noble proteins.

During my studies in chemistry and environmental engineering, I learnt how our body works and what it needs to do it well and how the food we consume impacts the environment. Recently I watched a reportage about people who affirmed to have cured cancer by changing their lifestyle and implementing a vegetarian diet.

The food pyramid sees daily portions of cereals and vegetables while weekly/monthly portions of animal products.

I was curious to delve into the subject and I started reading scientific publications, expert advices and watching further related documentaries. The majority of them suggested to reduce as much as possible the consumption of red meat and processed food in general to have a hopefully better and healthier life or at list to lower the risks of developing diet related illnesses.

I shouldn’t be so surprised after all, the old and famous Mediterranean Diet recommends to eat red meat and processed food only occasionally (a kind of once a month) and not everyday as we are used to do it today. As the statistics reveal, today we eat double the quantity of red meat that our fathers used to eat in the ’50s for instance.

Under an healthy point of view, the discussions over meat consumption and its relation with even serious illness has been widely debated in the past decades. There are experts saying that it is safe and we shall eat more of it and there are other scientist stating exactly the contrary. Objectively the meat that we have available today is totally different from the one that our ancestors could have eaten copiously. In fact the modern meat derives from animals that were born and raised in factories, fed with a mixture of things that should be, hopefully, grain-based and then pumped full of antibiotics and hormones to make them grow faster. Once the animal is slaughtered, the meat is added with some preservatives and other chemicals to maintain the meat tender, juicy and red.

The results of the American Medical Assn. studies.

This combination of substances, united to the metabolites created by the red meat itself, are considered as potential precursors of cancer cells and other diseases development. For this reason some Medical associations started compiling reports regarding the benefit linked to the reduction of red meat consumption as depicted in the figure above.

Feed required to produce 1 pound of product – National Geographic June 2014

Moreover, it is well known that the ecological footprint of the red meat is much higher than the other animal protein sources available on the market. The difference is even wider if we compare the livestocks requirements against the vegetables ones. As a matter of fact, a cattle needs to drink a lot of water and to eat a lot of grain and forage to grow. The rapport is almost 7 pounds of feed and some 50 gallons of water necessary to produce 1 pound of body mass as revealed by a study reported on the National Geographic magazine of June 2014. Therefore when we consume 1 pound of red meat, actually we eat 7 pounds of vegetables, drink few hundreds litres of water and wasted a lot of energy in transporting it, with the consequent impact on our ecosystem.

Apparently, among the animal protein sources, fish is the one that seems to have the less feeding requirements followed by chickens and pigs. If we analyse the various protein options available in relation to the greenhouse gas emission, we notice that there are options much more eco-friendly than the red meat and that the worst option is lamb that has a dramatic carbon footprint.

Protein Source Environmental Impact by ewg.com

In the graph here on the left, we have a study where greenhouse footprint deriving from the production and consumption of 4 Oz ( around 113 g) of a certain food is expressed in equivalent Car Miles Driven to allow us to better understand the real extent of their impacts. So, while a portion of organic milk, beans and other vegetables/leguminous have an equivalent impact of half driven mile, 4 oz of pork meat in average produce a quantity of greenhouse gas equivalent to  the ones you produce when driving your car for 3 miles. If you fancy a beef steak, you should keep in mind that 4 Oz of red meat cause the production of greenhouse gas equivalent to almost 7 miles driven and the same quantity of lamb produce almost 11.

Again, fish and pork seem to be a better choice than beef and lamb.

I am definitely not a scientist or an expert in livestock management. But I am an Environmental Engineer with a Chemistry profile and I can easily understand some implications deriving from the consumption of red meat as I tried to explain in the paragraphs above.

It is indisputable that an excessive consumption of red meat can cause serious healthy problems like increased probability of colon cancer, heart diseases, hormonal disequilibrium, kidney overload and many others. Moreover it is easy to understand that if we choose to avoid eating that 1 pound of beef meat we actually free 7 pounds of grain or other vegetable products and 50 gallons of water that could feed and satisfy much more people lowering the overall environmental impact.

I would recommend you to watch the short video that Graham Hill posted on TED.com where he proposes a shocking alternative that is in the middle between being vegetarian and carnivore: the weekday vegetarian diet. His idea consist in being vegetarian from Monday to Friday and than be free to add some fish, chicken and occasionally beef on the weekends.

It is a good compromise because you will feel healthier, the environment will be grateful and you will have saved some money.The short video is very effective and I warmly invite you to watch it.

I purposely left the argument cruelty against the animals aside because I preferred to bring up just objective facts. However please feel free to add comments and your point of view to enrich this discussion.

Recipe Corner: Vegetable Quiche

Sometimes it can be tough to get the daily 5 portions intake of vegetables and fruits as many doctors recommend. I personally like fruit and have it once a day, but when it comes to veggies, I struggle to complete that plate full of boiled carrots or salad. The problem is that I get bored of eating the same kind of food for more that few days, hence I need to “invent” something different.

Yesterday I had some mixed leftovers to eat including a mozzarella (expiring that day), some broccoli, peas and spinach and few eggs.I decided then to prepare the famous Quiche Lorraine with the vegetables I had available, instead of following one of the dozens recipes available in internet like the one with bacon and double cream promoted by BBC or the spinach and bacon proposed by Foodnetwork.

It is extremely easy to make and cook and we can do it together step by step.First thing chose the backing tray because its dimension is important to understand the quantities to use. I have bought a ready to cook pastry puff roll since it is easier, faster and more convenient than backing just that little amount of pastry, but if you prefer to make it by yourself it is going to be even better.

Then boil the broccoli, peas and spinach (baby spinach or frozen ones are alright) I had available until tender. I dried them up very carefully,  especially the spinach that need to be squeezed until dry. The presence of the water in the pie will turn your crunchy delight in a boiled mix of vegetable that we want to avoid. If you are not sure about the quantities to use, I  have used for a pastry roll some 100g of frozen broccoli, a small cup of frozen peas and about 250g of spinach.

Any kind of cheese is suitable for a Quiche

Once dry, cut the veggies in chunks (especially the broccoli and the spinach leaves) and pour them in a bowl. Add the mozzarella cheese you have cut in small cubes, any other cheese you need or want to use (I used a mysterious Russian cheese) and a slice or two of chopped turkey breast ham or cooked pork ham.

You can start mixing the ingredients and add some pepper if you like, nutmeg (it’s my favourite) and a handful of Parmigiano (Parmesan Cheese) that will give to the mix the required salty taste without the need to add salt. Once you are done with the mixing and verified that the quantity is suitable for the tray you have chosen, add two entire eggs and mix well. You will feel a sudden change in the consistency of the ingredients. You should add eggs until the ball of mixed ingredients is fluid enough to be poured and levelled.

Lay the pastry puff in the tray with the oven paper and add the mixed ingredients. Ideally, you should reach almost the top of the pastry puff and roll the exceeding quantity in order to make a sort of crust. Once ready, put it in a pre-heated oven at 180 Celsius for 30 minutes circa. Once it is cooked, hence the crust is slightly brown and the eggs are completely solid, you might turn on the grill and let the surface of the pie cooking for 1 or 2 minutes.

The quiche after cooking shall look like brownish on top and the eggs shall be completely cooked.

Once you get the quiche out of the oven, you need to wait some times because the pie needs to cool off before being served. It is a complete meal, reach in fibres, proteins and vitamins, hence it does not need any side dish. It is great also for parties since its intense flavour make it suitable with drinks and friends.

The rich vegetable quiche should have more green stuff than others.

Restaurant Review: Marie Antoniette – Mahe, Seychelles

We stayed few days in Seychelles to recover from the frenzy life style in Dubai and enjoyed some peaceful moment in this tropical paradise. We enjoyed the beach, nature and meals in one of the best resort on Mahe island (Constance Ephilia Resort) but the last day we decided to give a try to one of the most recommended restaurants in Victoria with a good reputation about Creole cuisine (the local one).

The restaurant is located in an old colonial house in a quiet neighbourhood at few minutes walk from the city centre. If you come from the north part of the main island, it is pretty much on the way to the airport and as such it is very convenient to escape the routine dinners in resorts and hotels to try something different before flying out the archipelago.

Marie Antoniette Restaurant is in a luxurious colonial house – photo from Google Image

The menu is very minimal even though includes all the local food you might want to  leaving the place. The recommended one is the fixed price menu that allows you to taste a bit of everything for a very reasonable price if compared to what you are most probably going to pay in the hotels’  restaurants. For just 295 SCR (Seychelles Rupees – something like 22 USD)  we enjoyed a 8 courses dinner with Papaya chutney, Fish and vegetable soup, tuna steak, battered parrot fish, fried aubergines with coriander, mango salad, grilled fish, chicken curry and steamed rice. Even though the food was already prepared, in fact we received it within few minutes after our order, everything was very tasty and with the right texture and consistence. If it is your first time travelling in this area of the world, get ready to be exposed to a certain level of curry, pepper and coriander that are regularly added to your food. Different story is a hotel restaurant that prepares its food to be similar to the western-like taste.

The fix menu at Marie Antoinette is great

The Stewed Fruit Bat at Marie Antoinette is superb!

If you think that a fried parrot fish and a mango salad are too ordinary for you and you consider yourself a ‘food explorer’, then the stewed fruit bat is what you might want to try. The island is rich in this animals that  eats exclusively fruits and fly all day long from a tree to another without disturbing/being disturbed by the tourists massive presence. The bat prepared at Marie Antoinette is superb and I am confident you will find yourself considering ordering an extra portion. It tastes like game or goat but the meat consistency is slightly different.  Try it with a good local beer and I am sure you will thank me for the suggestion. If eventually you do not like it, at least you will have a nice photo to share in your favourite social media to get your friends and relatives astonished comments like “WTF?”, “what next? a rat?” and the like.

After the massive dinner, we had some caramelised local bananas and then we asked for the bill. Well no major surprises, we spent something like 995 SCR (76 USD)  in two that was cheaper than the standard dinner at our hotel (always around 1,500 SCR).

Just remember that the taxis are very expensive and as such it would be expensive to hire a cab with the only purpose of having dinner at this restaurant, unless you are very close to Victoria or you need to go there for any other reason.

The management and the crew were very attentive and polite and helped us to feel at home since the first moment we stepped in. The restaurant has also its own website for further information.

Restaurant Review: Nama Tavern – Limassol, Cyprus

On our last day in Limassol, we wanted to break the hotel routine and enjoy a dinner somewhere in town. We were not  feeling like going to far, hence we looked for aome traditional restaurant close to our hotel. We checked on TripAdvisor and he internet and found a potentially good restaurant just next to us.

Nama Tavern Website looked ok

We arrived there at 6.30 pm after a long walk to Aphrodite’s Acropolis that is located in Amathous, 2 km from our hotel. We were exhausted and famished and couldn’t wait to enjoy a nice and relaxing dinner.
We were welcomed in an empty restaurant (6.30 pm is not really the common dinner time here) by the owner, a friendly and polite man that made us feeling like home.

We picked a table in a beautifully maintained veranda and ejoyed the calm atmosphere also offered by the plants and flowers cultivated by the owner (like grapes, jasmin and others).

Nama Tavern offers seating in a nice veranda with a wide variety of plants and flowers

We asked the owner to bring us a KEO beer and some water and proceed very slowly with a meat meze, one of the traditional Cypriot dishes.

The meze are sharing platters that usually include tzatziki sauce, a greek salad, tashi sauce, beetroot, grilled halloumi cheese, pork suvlaki (skewers), chicken suvlaki, sausages, pork loin, pork/lamb chops, grilled potatoes,  wine leaves and many other things up to a total of 18/20 small plates to taste with warm pita bread.

The service was excellent, very attentive and polite. As requested, they served the meze very slowly and allowed us to enjoy our food for almost 2 hours.

Just note that the food is enough for 2 very hungry people, therefore do not spoil you appetite with appetizers. At the end of the dinner, they brought us a piece of local dessert, a kind of cheese backlawa and a good portion of local watermelon. Everything was yummy.

The meze is slightly less than 20 euro per person and in total we paid 47 euro, drinks included. Very reasonable price given quality and quantity of food.

Surely recommended for a good meal in a nice location with a great service.

Restaurant Review: Crocodile Bar – Paphos, Cyprus

We stopped at Crocodile Bar one afternoon for a quick snack, since we skept lunch during our tour of Paphos city.
The pub was almost empty because at 4pm most of the people were still at the beach enjoying the wanderful sun Cyprus has to offer.

We were welcomed with a smile by a waiter and decided to have a quick pork kebab as late lunch. When we ordered, the waiter complained with our choise saying that the pork kebab was too heavy for that hour of the day and insisted to have us changing it with a chicke  kebab. My partner accepted the proposal but I confirmed my order.

The pork kebab meat was very tough and it was served with a lot of fries

After a while, the guy came back with our dishes: some meat chuncks, pita bread, very little salad and a big portion of fries. As I said, I did not particularly enjoyed the pork cubes and my partner did not like much even the chicken ones. They were just ok to calm our appetite we thought.

That night we missed lunch and the day after we had a very light breakfast. Something in that meal was heavy to digest, maybe the fries or the meat itself.

Prices are in line with the competitors. 2 kebab, water and beer cost something like 23 Euro for 2 people.

Restaurant Review: Romeo’s Tavern – Paphos, Cyprus

During our stay in Paphos we tried different Cypriot food in different restaurants. We noticed that Sunday evening many restaurant are closed and that english pubs and italian restaurants are more numerous than greek/cypriots taverns.

Yesterday we found only one Cypriot restaurant open: Romeo’s Tavern.
We were welcomed by the owner of the restaurant and promptly seated next to the window. The service was fair: one waitress was rude and the other one, even though more friendly and mannered, did not have a ‘five star’ training.

We wanted to try some local “meze” (little portions of food to share) and a new white wine.
The meze are enough for two hungry people since you will receive 16 to 18 different things to taste. We were starving and ordered also a starter and it was a bad idea because then we struggled to finish the ‘meze’.

Cypriot Meat Meze is enough for 2 people

In fact, the small portions of food included pickled celery, olives, grilled halloumi, tzatziki souce, tashi (tahini and garlic dip), greek salad, beetroot, lountza (smoked pork grilled), grilled and fried chicken, pork souvlaki, chicken liver and other different kinds of sausages with different spices like cumin for instance. And pita bread of course.

The wine wasn’t bad but we had much better ones for little more during our stay in Cyprus.

Thisbe white wine was good but not really the top

Please note that the meat meze is an heavy dinner, salty and spicy, hence you might face a fierce thirst during the night.

At the moment of the bill, we had a bad surprise. Wine, Meze and an appetizer costed us 54 Euro. Slightly less of what we would have paid if we had chosen to eat at Ficardo again, which in terms of quality of food and service is much much better.

Reastaurant Review: Delicious – Paphos, Cyprus

We explored the ancient ruins of Paphos, which include a medieval castle, houses of noblemen of the 2nd Century, ancient churches and tombs of the Kings.

We started from our hotel at 10 am and we finished the tour at around 4 pm. As in every holiday, we stuffed ourselves as much as possible at breakfast, in order to have fuel enough to walk around without the need to stop for lunch after few moments.

However, around 3 pm i was famished and had to grab some food. Close to the harboor and the main bus station, there is a lively streat with reataurants and pubs. Many of them were offering fresh fish, other were offering quick meals.

We opted for Delicious, since it offered wraps and local sandwiches and other easy things.

I ordered a Pork Suvlaki (literally pork skewers) and a pint of Keo (local beer) and my partner ordered a vegeterian sandwich.

The Souvlaki came with pita bread, fries, salad and tzitzaki souce. It was great in taste and presentation and was very filling also because they served it with a good portion of fries. The Keo beer is also very good.

The service is all right. We have received our drinks and meals in a reasonably quick time and enjoyed the attentivness of the staff. They were not very fluent in English though we managed to effectively communicate.

After the massive meal, we had the brilliant idea to share a chocolate crepes. Please note that it is huge and can substitute a meal if you eat it alone.
As digestive i took a Cypriot Coffee, a slight alteration of the Turkish coffee.

The price was within a reasonable range since we paid 45 euro for the suvlaki, vegeterian sandwhich, crepes, water, beer and two mocktails.

Restaurant Review – Ficardo – Paphos, Cyprus

Since in Dubai it is very hot at the moment and the Holy month of Ramadan is ongoing, we have decided to concede ourselves a short break in Cyprus where to celebrate my partner birthday.

Our holidays in Cyprus started in Paphos, an anciet city now UNESCO heritage centre.

During our stay, we had dinner in Ficardo restaurant, one of the best in town.

When we walked in, we were warmly welcomed by the hostess and the other people working in the venue. The menu offers many options starting from appetizers, soups and salads to desserts and coffee.

We wanted to try the famous Cypriot Meat Meze but unfortunately we were told we had to book it a day in advance since it isn’t available on the spot.
We decided then to have cypriot dips as starter and moussaka (minced meat with eggplants and bechamelle sauce) and Stifado (beef stew) as mains.

The dips were tzatziki (yougurt with cucumber sauce), cypriot hummus (a bit spicy) and a pinkish cream we failed to understand what it was.

My stifado was amazing with beef cutlets cooked at perfection, very tender and tasty. The dish comes with vegetable, a little steamed rice and fries.

Stifado (beef stew) is a Cypriot Traditional Dish

Just note that the mains are big enough to fill you up, hence do not exagerate with the starters. We were struggling to finish the mains after having had the simple dips to share.

Petritis White Wine was excellent.

We asked the waiter to rec
commend a nice bottle of wine. He came back with a semi-dry but fruity wine called Petritis, a locally produced wine. Wonderful. It would have been better to enjoy it with some fish instead of a beef stew, but it was really excellent.

The service was brilliant. Our waiter was extremely friendly and attentive. We had a very pleasant dinner.

At the moment of the bill, we had a nice surprise: 45 Euro for two people with the quite expencive wine included (19 euro).

If you are in Paphos, you should pay a visit to this restaurant.