Nirvana In Beverly Hills

The last similar-sounding food concept to hit us was nouvelle cuisine several years ago. These artistic displays of food which wouldnt keep a self-respecting mouse happy has already met its natural conclusion summary removal without remorse. It also left a lot of experimental-food sceptics such as myself in its wake.

So when Michael Rotondi, an architect much celebrated for his work on creating a campus for native American Indians and a fabulous city-park in Nagoya, Japan among other things, talked me into visiting a French-Vietnamese fusion restaurant in Los Angeles, I was sceptical.

Le Colonial had been described as the first to-see-and-be-seen in place to hit Los Angeles in years. With the patron list reading like the Whos who of Hollywood, I was sure about the company of the rich and the famous but unsure about the food. This stemmed partially from the fact that on my last visit to LA, I was trapped into visiting another French-Vietnamese restaurant called The Crustacean at Beverly Hills. A place with unimaginative food and rather large sums on the cheque for the minuscule portions ordered by my host with an eye more on the prices column than the food description on the menu.

 

I was deliciously surprised by Le Colonial. Its old world charm was accentuated by potted banana plants, lazily whirring ceiling fans, faded oriental rugs, low couches and black and white prints. This, coupled with its address at the Beverly Boulevard, west Hollywood, must have had something to do with its popularity with the in-crowd.

Hugh Grant, Mick Jagger and Richard Gere were there just the other night, so the waiter said. We had to settle for a couple of dignified looking ladies who must have been sensational a decade back. The food was something else altogether.

Lighter and less oily than Chinese food, the emphasis was on seafood and vegetables cooked in low-fat oil with a lot of emphasis on fresh herbs. The French influence was apparent in the subtle nuances with the Vietnamese interplay of flavours very different from those other strongly spiked regional cuisines such as Thai or Malay.

We decided to give the soup a go by, even though the maitre-d highly recommended the ox-tail soup, and went straight for Goi Cuan soft salad rolls with shrimp, lettuce bean sprouts, rice vermicelli and aromatic herbs wrapped in rice paper and served with a delicious dipping sauce called Hoisin. The other starter that we opted for was a second kind of rolls called Banh Tam Giac deliciously stuffed with shrimp, pork, water chestnuts and mushrooms. Both the starters had a very wholesome fresh herb flavour.

Main course consisted of the most heavenly aromatic Ca-Hap daintily wrapped fillet of Chilean sea-bass, tomatoes, mushrooms and spring onions in banana leaves. Lightly steamed. These little packets of delight, when opened let out that most magical smell of a lemon grass and ginger combination in whiffs which lingered over the table for a while keeping our gastric juices flowing.

This was accompanied by a Cari Ga a delicately flavoured curry sauce with saut