Review: Taste of Dubai

As promised, we will give you our impressions of the Tastes of Dubai festival, that was held last weekend.

In short: if you like food and wine, and like to get to know more about restaurants and all kinds of culinary products, this festival is a must-visit for you.

The idea is simple: you gather a number of restaurants and let them offer samples of a starter, main course and dessert. You add a couple of tents where wine tastings, and cooking masterclasses are held, and finally, you give importers and producers of culinary products the chance to promote their goods. Put all this in a relaxed setting, and you have Taste of Dubai.

This was the second edition of the festival. The word had spread fast, because there was a nice crowd on Thursday evening. As a result the wine tastings were all fully booked at the beginning of the evening, and many of the masterclasses faced a full tent. It looks like there is room for growth next year!

And how was the food? Well, there were some very nice dishes, but especially main courses didn't quite live up to the usual standards of e.g. Gordon Ramsay's Verre or Gary Rhodes' Mezzanine. Of course, it isn't easy to cook high level dishes at such a fast pace, in what probably is a less than ideal kitchen, but still... if it is meant as advertising for the restaurant it should be good. Are there other things to moan about? Sure. The organisation could have made it clearer that bars closed at 11.30PM, so we (and many others) could have gotten rid of our coupons before that time. But other than that this festival is a joy to visit, and a very good way to learn of new products and places. Make sure you don't miss it in 2010!