It was a sweet sweet autumn evening, the sun was getting ready to set, and I was excited to take some pictures from the rooftop of the O Monot Luxury Boutique Hotel… I had forgotten that the Beirut landscape had dramatically changed over the past 10 years and the sea isn’t really visible anymore from an 11th floor rooftop, at least not the way I was hoping it was… but that was not the purpose of my visit of course… it was more of a food gastronomy and chocolate event… supposedly…
The hosts were great, warm, smiling, welcoming, the employees groomed nicely and all looking great. The wooden tables and the purple setup was beautiful, and the couches very comfortable. The rooftop atmosphere was cool with a touch of humidity, but not enough to be bothered by it, au contraire, it felt really good and set the mood perfectly for what we were all hoping was gonna be a true pallet delight and a sweet sight for my Nikon lenses (that I have been polishing the night before, especially for this occasion…)
All right then… the painful part, here goes:
I truly hate to have to say that, or type that…but oh well:
We first were served a plate of what appeared to be like croque-monsieur bouchées… (I am not sure though), and, while it tasted fairly ok, it was far off of what an item in a “luxurious” boutique hotel should be, taste, and look like… there was absolutely no effort made on originality or presentation…
The second plate was what we all thought “ka3ek” until I tasted them… it was actually mozzarella sticks… obviously overcooked since the crust was brown instead of being golden, which had induced the mistake of thinking they were “ka3ek” in the first place.
That was followed with a bowl of steamed (and overcooked) Edamame (soybeans)… okay… not in the list of gourmet dishes… but why not… moving on…
While waiting for the “suite” we realized that our table was still filled with empty dishes, so we called a waiter and in a very friendly way asked him to remove them, to which he replied, “okay I will be right back” but of course he didn’t so we had to call him back again and this time he replied: “sorry ana la wa7de” (sorry I’m alone on the job). There were 4 or 5 other waiters roaming the rooftop…
The main course arrived: Ô stupeur… a big plate that had mini skewers of beef, chicken, salmon, and calamari… yes ladies and gentlemen, the meat and chicken on the very same plate with fish and seafood… not only it does not make sense to present those item together… but it also is a nonsense on the food hygiene and safety level. The plate was also without any decoration, just skewers on a plate, skewers that were poorly marinated with only the beef having real taste, the chicken was on the limit of being undercooked… (hello salmonella).
At this point, now that we had “les grillades” we were ready for dessert… but oh wait… what’s that coming now? Ohhhh! mini burgers! Okayyyy, it is after all commonly known in food milieus that mini burgers are served straight after “macheweh”…
No worries… the mini burgers are here, let’s try them: By now you should already know that there is no presentation, a Snack Restaurant would present its burgers better… a mini meat patty, sautéed mushrooms, cocktail mayo ketchup sauce… thank you very much…
My seat neighbor ordered a whisky with 2 ice cubes only… he got a short glass filled with ice… another ordered a diet seven, and never got it… which reminds me… the water bottles… glass… so nice so appealing… so old… yes… old… each bottle had on its top a thick trace of petrified mineral residue… consistent only with old bottles stocked for a long time and taken out for what was supposed to be a special occasion…
When I asked for the food and beverage manager, the answer was: “he is not here tonight”…
Finally the dessert… or the shadow of it… crème brulée… in a tiny plate about 4 cm of diameter and 3 millimeter thick… one spoon… two if you have a small mouth…
Thank you ladies and gents… it’s a wrap… but O no no… no more O Monot…
Gaston Le Rapporteur
Leave a Reply