Doing it in style

I was out on Saturday with Father and, after a strenuous morning of signing, shopping, socialising and scouting, we found ourselves in one of the better hotels in the city, looking for lunch. And it was to a coffee shop that we had once known well in a slightly different location that we gravitated, knowing that my nose was shiny with sweat and sunburn, that Father’s feet were tired of his formal shoes and we wanted little more than a very large glass of very cold water with which to wash down the morning’s peregrinations. We wandered to a table by the window yet sheltered from the sun and sat down. If there had been a way that I could have put my feet up, I would have, but it was a fancy hotel, the tablecloths were snowy clean and the hostess too immaculately stiffened and neat for me to charm my usual way through it all. So we sat there, gently counting down the seconds until the icy water arrived, smiling rather idiotically albeit fondly at each other.

Then decisions had to be made. What would we eat? Will it be a la carte or the buffet? After all, buffets are notorious for being composed of leftovers, weren’t they? And for afters? Pudding? What would dessert be? We both liked chocolate. But in this heat and with my paranoias about high cholesterol, low salt, high blood pressure, acidity and more, what would be most advisable? The waiter, bless his rounded little face a vaguely ingratiating smile, came over with a suggestion: the buffet, perhaps? We should look, we decided, and walked around the stretch of serving dishes laid out to see what was on offer. And the big platter of smoked salmon, pink, glistening and with absolutely no smell, except the faint tang of the lemon slices in a bowl nearby made my mind up for me. The buffet it would be.

We started at one end, examining all the salads. There was sprouts with slivers of green pepper; there was a heap of chopped apple and walnut, presumably rather deconstructed Waldorf; there was a wonderfully green bowl-full of lettuce, three kinds, separated by colour; there were small individual servings of tabbouleh and humus, chopped veggies and spring onions. There were bread baskets, holding white, dark rye, sundried tomato and olive, masala and multigrain. There was a tray of little martini glasses heaped with shrimp cocktail and a platter with salami, another with turkey close by. And there was that wonderful array of smoked salmon that pulled me into it, sort of like a surrealistic and very hungry Alice in Wonderland. But I looked and saw no trace of the traditional accompaniments – no sour cream, no capers, no sliced pickled onions. But I was happy. I ate bites of nicely buttered coarse grained bread with iceberg lettuce sprinkled with vinaigrette and mouthfuls of the salmon. I could have stopped there…or perhaps after a couple more helpings of the delicious fish.

But life, like the buffet, went on. I continued with a bite of this and a morsel of that. Fish in a sweet-sour brown gravy married happily with stir fried noodles. Chicken tikkas with kasoori methi were delicious when wrapped into a bit of butter-slathered hard roll. And prawn patio worked great with a sago wafer, the bland and the spicy off-setting each other with much joy. The vegetables, I ignored, startling myself by that, since none of them yelled “Eat me!” on the first round and I was by then too full to consider a second sortie. And, besides, dessert demanded attention.

That was a delightful combination, of small helpings that went well together. I slurped myself through a serving of chocolate parfait, carefully scraping off the decorative whipped cream and as carefully scraping every last smear of bittersweet chocolate sauce off the sides of the tall, slim glass. I demolished the passionfruit cheesecake in two not-very-large mouthfuls and I looked rather disdainfully at the tiny square of chocolate-iced cake that called itself a petit four. Our waiter, who was by then alarmingly paternal and beamed at us every time we happened to look up from out plates, offered ice cream and, when we refused both strawberry and banana-caramel, brought us some semi-sweet chocolate instead, earning himself a larger tip and some very positive reviews on the guest comment slip.

We finally staggered out of there, our tummies a little more stretched than they were used to and our smiles connecting one ear to the other. It was not a meal that we make a habit of, being rather more austere in our eating habits, but it was a lunch I certainly enjoyed. The company most of all.