Seablue

For those that like a good meal I am going to describe my Seablue meal while the memory is still fresh... It was a set, "Summer", menu with a few choices (details in the previous post), I'll just tell you what I had and the accompanying wines.

An amuse bouche of Bouillabaisse

Spring onion and oyster soup... A marriage made in heaven, and with a little surprise of a fresh oyster which had been quietly poaching at the bottom of the bowl - A glass of Cava

Unleavened bread with little tasters of Feta cheese, hummus and cucumber/yoghurt

Self-designed salad, Seablue is the only place I have seen this; you are handed a list of about 40 different ingredients and half a dozen dressings and choose up to ten of them... I chose spinach, roasted pepperoncino, shaved radish, plum tomatoes, red onion, pine nuts, white anchovies, Parmesan and roasted garlic and anchovy dressing - This came with a glass of Pinot Grigio.

Seared Arctic Char (like a trout/salmon cross... Irate?) with spiced rice, puy lentils and chick peas - With which I selected a glass of Rioja, to the mild concern of the waiter.

Then the Chocolate Mousse Cake, which came up like a rather posh and refined version of a Caramel Magnum ice cream - This came with a late bottled Taylor's port.

A really memorable meal, basic culinary principles recognised but imagination and flair in trumps.

The amount of food was perfect for me, certainly enough but I never felt overfaced (and this in a country where one TV ad's sales line for a TV dinner is "A pound and a half of food" with no specifics) the wines were all great examples of their type and the service was perfect... Amazingly so as I sat down at 6.00 and said to the waiter that I needed to be walking out the door at 6.55 (poker tournament at 7.00 {note to self, you don't play good poker after 4 glasses of wine})... This was achieved without fuss or bother.