Tokyo Mon Amour, Guppy By Ai
28, Lodhi Colony, New Delhi
Rs3,000 (without alcohol).
We have all been to these fancy eateries that are called restro bars or lounge cafes. But there is this new eating-out concept in town called these days, called the pop-up bar.
Guardian 20 visited Tokyo Mon Amour which, for the forthcoming season from Wednesday to Sunday, 7p.m. to midnight, turns into a pop-up bar dishing out deliciously intoxicating cocktails like the Wasabi Mimosa with fresh orange or wasabi-infused vodka and castor sugar topped up with sparkling wine, which we tried, along with a small plates menu prepared by Chef Vikram Khatri.
The pop-up café is a venture between Guppy by ai and Le Bistro du Parc offers a mix of bar favourites at Guppy by ai and Le Bistro du Parc along with some new Franco-Japanese dishes created especially for the menu of Tokyo Mon Amour (Tokyo, My Love).
Tucked away in the courtyard and the lounge of Guppy by ai. The pop-up café provides a perfect Japanese inspired minimalistic décor with benches being and desks being the seating options.
So, one look at the menu will tell you that the pop-up is a place that provides limited options for vegetarians as off the seventeen dishes that were mentioned in the pop-up’s menu only six cater to the vegetarians. To amplify the flavours that café offers a good selection of alcohol based concoctions. Meanwhile, the non alcoholic section has nothing pop-up about it as it is pretty much the same as that of the regular Guppy.
Now the cocktails Wasabi Mimosa with fresh orange and wasabi-infused vodka and castor sugar topped up with sparkling wine create a flavor party in your mouth with the tangy mustard like wasabi mixing with the flavor of the alcohol and the citrus sugar just closing the deal, making them the perfect liquids to wash of the preexisting flavor carnival that the Yoshoku dishes create.
The Curry Pan Bread is a Panko-crusted Japanese kare, bread; al ong with the cured tomato & ginko nut salad a three-daycured ‘chuka’ tomato salad with palm heart, celery, grapes and ginko with ginger-citron dressing and the cheese korokke a cream and gruyere cheese croquettes served with mayo and Japanese worcestershire sauce were our vegetarian bites.
Bacon wrapped in house chicken sausages with chives, soya honey & red wine glaze which basically was minced chicken tsukune, wrapped with bacon, topped with dates, chives and red wine and soy glaze; along with the guppy’s signature pork belly that was a slow-braised pork belly, glazed with soy-honey, served with mustard-miso sauce; a platter of in-house cold-smoke salmon with micro cress, dill & crème fraîche i.e a sakura wood-smoked scottish salmon topped with dried purple shiso salt, dill and sour cream and the famous sushi which also gets a french style, as the tempura sushi rolls with wasabi-citron soy or bacon and cream cheese sushi rolls with black rice formed our non vegetarian culinary escapade.
The vegetarian dishes are well crafted flavor pallet but failed to delight as much as the non vegetarian preparations. While the pork belly was very nicely done for the meat just melted upon its arrival in the mouth created the perfect blend of flavors created by the sauces carries the torch across the finish line.