Metro Plus
Bangalore
Chennai
Hyderabad
Dine like the stars
|
Want to tuck into the kind of stuff Pierce Brosnan and Julia Roberts love? Head for Paparazzi
|
Photo: V. Sreenivasa Murthy
BLOWN AWAY The bar counter at Paparazzi packs in plenty of fire
There are innumerable websites on the Internet that tell you what the stars in Hollywood eat, but how about sinking your teeth into their favourites right here in our own city? Welcome to Paparazzi, the city's first restaurant that offers celebrity cuisine.
We all know James Bond likes his vodka martini shaken and not stirred, but the last man to play Bond, Pierce Brosnan, is a sucker for spaghetti Bolognese with a bottle of cheap Chianti, an Italian wine. Winding the clock back, Marilyn Monroe used to dig Miss Milton's fudge pie, while today's siren Julia Roberts loves to down her food with scorpino, an Italian cocktail. If you thought the stars were on a perennial diet, then think again. Ben Affleck loves cheeseburgers and Jim Carrey tucks into grilled cheese sandwiches dipped in lots of ketchup.
The tabloid menu
Oh, I am not dishing out this star trivia from the Net, by the way. All this and more can be found on Paparazzi's, well, tabloid menu. Yup, what good is a celebrity restaurant without a tabloid that doubles as the menu? It has everything from the starters to the desserts, along with tasteful trivia about everyone from Robert de Niro to Whoopi Goldberg.
The restaurant is neatly tucked away in the 10th floor of the Royal Orchid Central at Manipal Centre. The door is quite unassuming, but once you walk in, the ambience really blows you away. Shine and sheen seem to be the theme here. Massive glass panels that give you an awesome panoramic view of Bangalore enclose three sides of the restaurant while the backlit furniture adds to the ethereal glow. The scene at night is especially fantastic, as you can see Bangalore all decked up. There is a bandstand set in a balcony above the salad bar, where a local band plays after 9 p.m. The bartenders, meanwhile, have a glitzy bar counter where they not only serve your drinks, but also entertain you with some fiery tricks.
Now for the food. With the rest of the restaurant so decked up, the food has to live up to the standards. And it does. You have to give the chefs here a 10/10 for the effort they take in making your food not just taste good but also look good. Everything from the way the salad is dressed to the way the main course is served is orchestrated to perfection.
I started with musk vegetable soup (thick soup served with dried black mushroom, tofu, spring onion and snow peas) and appetisers that included fresco Greek salad, five spice rib stickers (meaty spare ribs conjured in an Asian spice mix and slow roasted) and baked stuffed courgettes (courgettes filled with peppers, mushrooms, soft cheese and oven dried tomatoes, slow roasted in a papilotte served with peppered tomatoes).
The cuisine here is very varied and you have everything from pastas to Thai curries. So there are plenty of options to mix 'n' match. But there is no Indian fare. Don't head here if you are very keen on naan and dal makhni.
For the main course, I tucked into Shanghaied langoustine (spiny lobster pan seared in chilli and hot garlic sauce), traditional coq au vin (a preparation from the French Riviera that contains grain fed chicken and red wine), honey glazed pork chops with seeded mustard, wok tossed Asian greens in chilli oyster sauce (Asian greens in oyster sauce blasted with toasted sesame) and Moroccan vegetable stew (vegetable stew served with home made focaccia bread).
For those of you with some space left after such a heavy spread, there is some stuff from the Paparazzi Flaming Sword section that offers the likes of corn-fed chicken chanduri with mild peri peri chillies and kid lamb chops in a vindaloo chilli coat. Also try some of the loads of pastas and rissotos on offer.
Last, but not the least...
Finally time for dessert, where I went for a classic tiramisu with a touch of Maria (classic Italian dessert layered with mascarpone cheese). But there is also café and calvados infused cream brule, coconut and pineapple parfait, home made ice-cream with seasonal berries in port wine jello and Hindustani phirni for variety.
Dining in this restaurant is all about experiencing high life. But make sure you have a pretty deep wallet before you step in.
For reservations call 25584242.
Ambience: Hip and classy
Service: Attentive
Specialty: Celebrity cuisine
Wallet factor: On the higher side
ANAND SANKAR
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Metro Plus
Bangalore
Chennai
Hyderabad
|
