IT’S always nice to know how the other half live. The Whisperer, Bahrain’s favourite columnist, is a regular and often suggests I should join him ‘at the club’ moments before mumbling about his latest item of hot gossip and conveniently forgetting to specify a time or date.
In the two years since the Capital Club, Bahrain’s premier private business club, opened its doors on the uppermost floors of the iconic Bahrain Financial Harbour, I’ve visited it three times.
Once for a lunch-time business meeting with a cigar-smoking female executive, a boardroom-style gathering for the launch of the new McLaren road car and for a presentation by an internationally-acclaimed ‘positive thinking’ guru.
This time was different. Kathryn, the good lady wife, and I, were guests of Cyrille Troesch, the club’s food and beverage director and executive chef, who has been splitting his time between the company’s Dubai operation and its Bahrain base.
Perhaps he’d heard whispers, maybe from the PR company which had set up our appointment, that the GulfWeekly reaches the readers lesser publications could only dream about ... but he was very proud to show off the new tapas restaurant on Level 51, the Capital Club’s newest dining option.
Its name may not be particularly inspiring but the Skyline Lounge certainly has a view over Mamama which can only be beaten by the window in the club’s gents restroom.
The decor is well in keeping with the relaxed atmosphere, lots of cool blues from the ceiling lighting down to the large empty bottle on the bar with a lightbulb inside.
The new menu is mightily impressive with a choice of 40 tapas treats at just BD2 a dish. The fare can be split into four sections, there’s sucullent Japanese sushi, aromatic Arabic, spicy Indian and mouth-watering Mediteranean.
Choice appears to be the main ingredient of the Capital Club’s success story and with good reason. Unlike a regular restaurant the members frequent it several times a week and would not be attracted to a place that continued to serve up the same fare, week in, week out.
As a result there are frequent changes and different specials delivered in its fine dining restaurant and lounges to keep head chef Mouhamed Ibrahimi and his team on their toes and the club’s members coming back for more.
The club had grown to 896 members, a 25 per cent increase when compared to the previous year.
Membership is by invitation only with various packages for Bahrainis and expatriates and I’m pretty sure that if you need to worry about how much it costs to join, you probably can’t afford it.
There is no questioning the value for money of the food. It would take a greedy man indeed to savour the flavour of all the dishes available in one sitting but we polished off a fair few, including that Spanish favourite Boquerones en escabeche, pickled anchovies served on toasted garlic croutons and mixed bell peppers.
The Smoke Duck Umbrella was a treat too with a delicious red onion marmalade and my Indian colleagues in the office would no doubt have swooned over the Allo Matar Chaat, consisting of Kerela potato and sweet potato, green peas with roasted cumin seeds salad.
The food was as impressive as the red, white and sparkly accompanying beverages which we quickly realised made our own supply at home (particularly the awful two-month old boxed variety) pale into insignifance.
As Randy Crawford lightly tickled my ear drums from the sound system with her soulful voice, the evening turned into a sensory heaven.
Even the bread roll had the texture of cake. The Crazy Roll, however, quickly woke me from my slumber. This Thai sushi number with shrimp tempura and crabstick with cucumber glazed with teriyaki and sweet chilli sauce had a subtle kick.
Kathryn’s favourite was the home-cured dried peppered beef lomo and, although it was a close call, I would have to plum for the California Special, a sushi roll with crab, flying fish and cucumber.
The Tapas restuarant theme has so much going for it, it’s just ideal for chilling out over good conversation – especially if you’re caught up in the stressful world of big business or high finance.
Without question there will be some big deals bashed out over sushi and the heady heights of Manama in the coming months in the Skyline Lounge. I must remember to mention it to the Whisperer.
