European joyride

A new restaurant in Kala Ghoda balances seasonal and local produce that come together in an eclectic Euro-Mediterranean-inspired menu

I can't wait for all this to pass, so I can return to “social distancing” on my own terms.’ Etched on a pair of wooden, saloon-style doors leading to the restaurant’s restrooms, this quote is a truism we’re living by today. Dining companion-bereft (due to a last-minute ditch), we play the part of a solo diner at our table and at Recca; the ennui is exacerbated by the gloomy, rainy weekday afternoon we choose to drop by.

Never once making us feel conscious or uncomfortable in our forced solitude, the restaurant’s waiting staff lavish their undivided attention on us, as they help us navigate their interesting, eclectic menu conceptualised by chef Sabyasachi Gorai of Lavaash, Delhi and Byg Brewski of Bengaluru. The Euro-Mediterranean cuisine restaurant takes patrons through the Levant, Greece and Armenia, with a few stopovers in Spain and Portugal.

The ingredients however, we’re informed, are in keeping with locality and seasonality of available produce. Cheeses like kalari from Jammu and Kashmir and chenna poda from Odisha, alongside Maharashtra’s monsoon season-only phodshi bhaji are among other hyperlocal ingredients, we spy on the menu.

Himalayan salt grilled herb quail

All this in a contemporary-chic first floor setting of a heritage Kala Ghoda building that once housed the pan-Asian restaurant Joss. Done up in muted shades of cream and pink, with plenty of burnished gold accents, vertical garden walls and terracotta-hued furnishings, Recca’s spacious interiors, much like its menu, do not conform to any particular genre.

This nonconformity is what we taste when we bite into a slice of the indigenous cheese pizza (Rs 455). Here, a paper-thin sheet of Armenian-style lavash bread is anointed with olive oil and a duo of smoky artisanal cheese from Bengal and aged cheddar, with a flourish of mesclun greens topping it. This flatbread is one of the best iterations of thin-crust pizza we’ve ever eaten, with the spiciness of the basil leaves melding well with the creaminess of the cheeses.

Skipping the pricey cocktails that start at a mind-numbing Rs 600 per pop, we settle for an ice tea. The honeydew (Rs 195) option we pick is a tall concoction of black tea and fresh melon juice; it’s well-balanced and has a sweet and sour mocktail base mix.

Honeydew ice tea

Although available post 7.30 pm — as clearly annotated on the menu — we test the accommodating nature of the kitchen by requesting the Himalayan salt grilled herb quail (Rs 755) for our lunch’s main course, eschewing the chicken and lamb options. This request is met with promptness as succulent portions soon find their way to our table. It sits atop a bed of yummy root vegetable mash, sautéed amaranth leaves and finished off with a dusting of the au courant hemp seed salt and a red pepper coulis.

However, the homely-style east coast orange and jaggery cake (Rs 525) seems as though it was made by an overindulgent grandmother who is infamous for her heavy-handedness with sugar. Cloyingly sweet, we can barely taste the promised nolen gur (jaggery), with only the faintest hint of orange flavour emerging from a dessert that we had pinned so much hope on. The cake leaves us with the realisation that not all endings have to be “this sweet”.

At: Recca, 1st floor, Kala Ghoda Society, K Dubash Marg 
Time: 12 noon to 10 pm 
Call: 8433737344/66

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