ROASTOWN-Global Cuisine Restaurant — Restaurant in Kerala

My wife and I visited this place for lunch recently. I had heard a lot about this place before especially for their grills. First things first, the restaurant seems to be located inside a residential area so locating it the first time could be a confusing experience.

The Thrissur outlet is quite small, has about 10 tables max. The ambience is pretty relaxing and fine dine of sorts at the same time. Full marks for ambience. 👌🏼

Coming to the food, the menu kind of caught me off guard. They really mean it when they say “Global grill”. It’s a mix of a lot of gourmet dishes from different cuisines across the world. We ordered Fish and Chips, Chicken tenders and Manti (an Armenian dumpling dish apparently) and Tender Coconut and Mango vervain for dessert.

The Chicken Tenders was pretty good, prepared to standards although nothing mind blowing. Noticed the condiments served with the dish were different from the ones mentioned in the menu. We got garlic aoili and “salsa” (I think) instead of the Mustard mayo and Rasberry chilli dip mentioned in the menu. The garlic aoili was good 👍🏻 but the “salsa” felt like an after thought. I think it was made with ketchup mixed with chopped onions and tomatoes 😕 The fish and chips were okay. I think there was baking powder in the batter around the fish, it was very airy. I doubt if the authentic recipe uses it. The fries are made in house with skin. Both these starters came with a small side of dressed greens, which was a nice touch. Again, the condiment served with the dish was the same garlic aoili instead of the chilli coriander mayo in the menu. Fish & chips usually is served with tartar sauce.

The Manti was a unique dish. I’ve never had it before so can’t say if this one’s the real deal/authentic but I ordered it because I found the combination of ingredients interesting. Chicken stuffed dumpling topped with garlic yogurt, caramalised tomato sauce and chickpeas. I don’t think what was served to us had chickpeas. The tomato sauce didn’t taste caramelised. Like I said, I can’t be the judge since I haven’t had it before. It was very mildly seasoned overall. I must highlight the service- it’s really slow. The chicken tenders was served first and the remaining 2 dishes took about 30 mins to be served that too only after they were reminded. The plate I got had a chipped off edge, cutlery needs proper management. Portion sizes of starters seemed reasonable but main course felt too less. Quite pricey as well.

I later realised I didn’t order any of their grilled dishes so that’s something I’m going back for but not for the ones I tried. Comments...

The restaurant is pretty nice and the plating for all dishes that we ordered and the ones we saw on other tables were also pretty and elegant. Would also like to thank them for accommodating my family without a prior booking on Christmas eve rush hour. The quality of ingredients used were also really good. But the food there was a huge dissapointment when it comes to taste. For the taste i would definitely argue that the place is highly overpriced. Being a person who takes taste as the first priority, the food didnot live upto the hype around this place.

The tenderloin salad was really good with quality beef cut with fresh greens and cherry tomatoes. But the french onion soup they served didnot have the expected melted cheese on top and the caramelized onions were burnt and gave a burnt taste to the entire broth. When I asked about this to the waiting staf, they argued that its the "smoked taste" from the soup. Which honestly was a very funny thing to hear about french onion soup. The next item being squid rings was a terrible one as the batter was too thich and you could taste the fried flour more than the fresh squid. The tenderloin steak that came next was perfectly medium rare and super juicy. But was extremely blant and the pepper sauce that accompanied it was although tasting decent felt like it was thickened with cornflour rather than a butter emulsion. Thus it was very unappetizing with the steak. The final item which was an uzbeki rice was super flavourful one with a really good balance of flavours in rice. The only problem being that the rice was overcooked and had lumps in them which wasnt pleasant to eat either. Considering the fact that my visit was on a christmas eve i would like to assume that these are probably things that got messed due to the rush, I would like to make a second visit hoping to have a better...

The place was crowded and we had to wait for about 15 minutes before we got a table for two. The long line gave me the initial impression, "whoah, they must be really good". But were they?

The service was not very welcoming for a fine dining place. 'വേണേൽ തിന്നിട്ട് പൊയ്ക്കോ' attitude. They had an online menu from which we could order directly to the kitchen, as we waited.

First came the soups. There was a Broccoli and Pine nut soup which was very delicious and a new experience. Then there was this Roast Chicken and Rosemary Garlic Cream Soup which was kind of ok, like your average cream of chicken soup with a slightly bitter twist of burnt onions/garlic. Soups were accompanied by not so special slices of bread, toasted. One easily notices how the table gets crammed by the over sized chinaware as the soup starts filling up most of your stomach.

Then came the Fruit De Mer. Mairu. Over priced sea food platter I wish that we never ordered. Was that tuna? With the dark meat? Yuk.

Then the Turkish Pilaf. Pilaf is just fancy pulao. Tasted like an average, dry 'kuzhi manthi' rice heavily seasoned with black pepper. The grilled chicken that came with the Pilaf was bland. Also served in a heavy, cast iron casserole which made serving onto the plate feel like gym workout.

The chocolate brownie was a visual treat but not as palatable as the looks. But atleast, it took away the lingering oily taste from the sea food platter, what a relief.

Overall, a pretentious, over...