Ristorante Bologna, An Italian Weekend

To celebrate my belated birthday, GUGU has generously treated me to a unique(to me at least) buffet lunch at Ristorante Bologna at Marina Mandarin Hotel. Sounds like a very imperial dining ground right? eXACTLY right! The hotel looks so grand the moment we entered through a miniscule door into it, i felt like entering a palace.HaHa..
I immediately asked for directions to the restaurant as we were a tad late and worrying a bit too much about they cancelling our reservation if we weren't prompt enough, as there were really too many people waiting impatiently to eat there.AS IF!HAHA..We were really too silly to even think about this, we were like the earliest and also the only table to be eating in there for the 1st hour. (well, an angmoh sat there eating by himself 1 hr later) I was amazed by their amiable and friendly service together with the high-class ambience, i felt too unfit to be there eating, seriously. The dessert buffet definitely looked appetising and tempting, lol..Oh, right, forgot to mention how the buffet goes. One waiter explained to us later on that for $45++, you get to enjoy 6 appetisers served to your table, any main course of your choice from the menu, and free serving of the dessert buffet. Not bad right? since the main courses itself can go up to as much as $38. We had 3 different main courses of course. I had the pan-fried Atlantic grouper with cashew cream sauce and nutmeg,GuGu had the oven-baked lamb rack with red wine sauce and spinach cake, while mama had the selection of mixed grilled seafood.
The appetisers combined of 3hot and 3 cold ones. The cold ones were all meat like hams which we really weren't suited very much to eat them, a bit alien to us actually so we just tried our best to eat as much of them as possible. Together with the freshly warmed breads and the olives in oil, they don't taste so bad ler..
The warm appetisers are the fried calamari, spinach cake and the grilled zuchinnis. Surprisingly i quite like the spinach cake as it was spinach omellete and very tasty. the calamaris were fried till crispy but not oily at all, so i pretty much prefer it to the 'half-cooked' hams..hahas..
We held on the main course for a while because we wanted to rest a while after the rather filling starters. A bit of desserts first,i had the pecan tart and chocolate truffle cake and also a bowl of fruits in syrup. Very disappointed at no fruits included because if there were, it would be even more perfect. I love the nutty texture of the pecan tart which was purely honeyed pecan piled on the buttery pie crust. Despite being very sweet, i still had 2 tarts in all. The chocolate truffle cake was also very nice, it wasn't very sweet and the layers of cream and cake was just perfect and melts in your mouth. I don't really fancy the fruits syrup though, it makes the fruits too artificial.
Finally,the main course arrived..The long awaited..hehe..
My fish turned out really yummy. The nutty cream sauce was a remarkable complement with the fish and mashed potato. The sauce wasn't too creamy or buttery, hence i love it. Mama's grilled items comprised of a huge prawn, scallops, salmon and cod fish. All were nice, the prawn rather jumbo and crunchy, while i like the cod which had a crispy base but with extreme'y soft-melt-in-your-mouth flesh. Gugu's rack of lamb was marvellous. I must applause the cook's baking skills! The crust was crispy while the thick meat neither too hard of not properly cooked. It was heavenly delicious. I felt like in 7th heaven!
Going on to desserts again, we actually had choice of coffee or tea so as usual gugu and i had tea while mama had coffee. Both my green tea and gugu's earl grey were served in a pot, isn't it great? Mama's coffee was also quite thick and aromatic you know..I took the fruit tart, chocolate expresso, tiramisu, marble cheese cake, and apple tart. I love everyone of them. They all tasted so sinful yet the irresistablity made us licked up every bit of them. The nuanced taste of the tiramisu was commendable as the expresso was so distinct! Had a short toilet break and when i got back , i caught sight of something. A fruits corner! There actually was fruits! Why did nobody tell us? Gosh, i love it mann..i am simply in love with this place! I quickly took a plate and piled it high with watermelon, pineapple and a fuji apple. the watermelons were so sweet and refreshing that i couldn't stop eating them, so was the pineapple which was not at all sour but had almost the same level of sweetness as the watermelon. Surprise surprise! I had never eaten such sweet pineapple for a long long time already!. then i had their sliced oranges, rock melon and honeydew. The oranges were peeled and cut very skilfully as not a bit of white fibre parts were noticeable. They were all rather sweet, i like the rock melon for the crunchiness and extreme sweetness. Hmm.. all in all, good fruits round up the meal just perfectly!

Oh, did i mention gugu bought a bottle of white wine too? 70 over bucks i think, i felt really bad to make her spend so much on every occasion where i was present, she always pampers me with such delicacies..I love you gugu!And mama too! For forcing yourself to eat so much despite it not suiting your palate at all, sorry!hehe..thanks!

Comments

Anonymous said…
Hi Brenda
I hope you have many more great birthday meals! Happy belated birthday.

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