Our New Favourite Restaurant: Blu

Last Saturday hubby and I headed out for dinner for a quiet evening out together. It’s so easy in Singapore: with over 3,000 restaurants it’s simply not possible to try them all and the choice of cuisine and location is endless. Having heard good things about the luxurious Shangri La Hotel which is just down the road, I delved into my trusty “Best Restaurants” guide then reserved a table at ‘Blu’ which serves “French inspired” food prepared by chef Robin Zavou from the UK. (He was chatting to people at the table next to us and when I heard him talk – assuming that he would be French – I was surprised that sounded like a genuine Surrey Lad!)
One thing you can say about the Shangri La (www.shangri-la.com/en) is that they know how to impress. This is where all the notables stay: whenever George Bush or any other leader turns up the whole of Orange Grove Rd, which is where the hotel is located, is cordoned off and to drive through you have to navigate security checks which is a bit of a pain because we drive down that road regularly. Back to the hotel: upon arriving guests are ushered into the huge opulent lobby by doormen dressed in a very fancy costume. I’ve no idea who they are supposed to represent but they look rather grand.
Up on the 24th floor Blu looks out over the city and we spent the first half hour perched on bar stools drinking ruby martinis and trying to identify landmakrs of the glittering city spread out before us. We could see as far as the Keppel shipyard and it’s at times like this you realise just how small Singapore really is.
As we finished the last of our drinks the head waiter magically appeared like a genie to usher us to our table, again with a view through the floor to ceiling glass over the city. The restaurant itself was absolutely beautiful, one of the nicest in terms of ambience and interior design that we've seen. Elegant blue lamps lighting each table, glass sculptures and invisible lights which cast wavering blue patterns like ripples of water over the arched ceiling give the impression of watery coolness. As an added bonus a live jazz band started at 9pm, providing music at a volume that added to the ambience without being so intrusive as to prevent us having a normal conversation. So far, so good.
The menu was a little concise with escargot, veal, and foie gras tending to dominate. These are three foods I try to avoid by the way, and the addition of a few dishes accompanied by oysters – the only seafood I really don’t like narrowed my choices substantially. However fortunately hubby was in the same adventurous frame of mind as me and we both chose the five-course specialty menu which did avoid most of those foods.
The food was, in a word FANTASTIC. From the warm foam of potato and leek topped with shaved black truffels, to the seared Chinese pork belly accompanied by pan fried scallop and a streak of pumpkin puree; from the rare beef medallion accompanied by beef tongue and a pot of ox-tail casserole on a cushion of turnip mousse to the pan fried foie gras; culminating in what must be the most perfect dessert I’ve ever eaten, a trio of raspberry creations. It was exquisite. The small portions were never overwhelming and were presented so beautifully I felt like photographing them. The service was perfect and appropriately enough we washed it all down with a nice sauvignon blanc from the Nappa Valley. It was one of those meals where you think to yourself “that course was so good, the next one is bound to disappoint” but it never happened, the quality was absolutely consistent.
Feeling like we’d just stumbled across Eldorado we walked back out into the warm breeze and relative cool of an evening washed clean by rain earlier on and decided to walk home. After a leisurely 20 minute stroll we were back in our living room and we still hadn’t stopped talking about how good it had been.
So there you go. Our new number one for food, service and location – check out Blu for the ultimate dining experience in Singapore.