A couple of months ago was when I discovered the Cocoa Bean Cafe in Kazhakuttom… I first thought of it to be just another coffee shop and basically stayed away since I am not really a Coffee enthusiast… However, in the EAT community, I began to see some posts by people who went there and it peaked my interest…
Although it calls itself a cafe and looks like one, it certainly is not just that… But rather its an Italian fine dining restaurant and that was completely unexpected at Kazhakuttom… The menu had a good collection of classic italian dishes that until then I could only see in the menus of places with a 5-7 star rating… For example, the Tuscan Shrimp salad with Balsamic reduction… The last time I saw this in a menu was when I went to the Sun N Sand Hotel in Mumbai, which is a 5 star hotel…
And yet here it is in a place thats practically at my door step 🙂 and also tastes quite close to the one I had in that much much more expensive place to eat… Other than this salad, I had a Prawn Chowder in my visit there which was heavenly to say the least…
Pretty much all places use corn flour to thicken their soup… Here its different as they use potato flour and hence has that potatoey flavour to it that works brilliantly with the shrimp in it… Served along with the soup to the side there is a piece of garlic bread…
I have been visiting this place multiple times since the first time and the place is yet to not surprise me with their food… One that requires special mention is a starter dish that I couldn’t believe that it was real…
They call this the Chicken Red Velvet Cake, which is basically a minced chicken meat (same as meatball) cutlet like thing with a piece of carrot inside and coated with red velvet powder (instead of bread crumbs), served with some bell peppers, mayo dip and a very strange green coloured sauce at the side… I asked the waiter what it is and he told me that its a mint sauce… Unfortunately that sauce is ruining the dish since its too sweet for me and maybe because of the sweetness, I couldn’t detect the mint at all and it really looks and tasted like a green coloured (food color that is) cream sauce… Other than the sauce, the dish tasted quite unique and interesting…
Then on another visit came across this which they call the Gamerialla Griglia…
I guess it was supposed to be Gamberi alla Griglia, which, here, is orange wine soaked prawns grilled and served with some fragrant vegetable rice and a cold tomato based sauce which tasted like Gespacho topped with some raw vegetables and yogurt dip (the white color in the dish’s pic)… This tasted really good and the prawns were cooked and seasoned perfectly… Only complaint is that in the menu they said it comes with jumbo prawns and the ones I got is hardly that…
Being an Italian restaurant, pasta is obviously good as I found out when I had their Fusilli Alfredo…
And being a cafe they have a bunch of drinks from hot and cold coffee to Frappes, Ices teas and smoothies… I tried their Mango Smoothie once and I can tell you it felt exactly like the one they serve at KFC 🙂
A good thing at-least for me is that portion sizes weren’t big and were just enough to enjoy the taste really well… I don’t like it when restaurants serve a lot because once you cross that threshold, you end up unable to enjoy the food anymore and you end up eating for the sake of it to avoid wastage, etc… This way, I get to order more items (can’t complain about pricing as I think its appropriate for the quality) and enjoy more flavour combinations 🙂
So, hopefully I’ll continue to get surprised by them in the days to come (which reminds me that its been a while since I have been there and I should be very soon 🙂 )… Once concern though is that most of the time I see the place empty, which gives me the creeps as to whether they will close down… I for one hope that it never happens… 🙂