Restaurant review: Rivington Grill, Souk Al Bahar

The quest for the perfect recession-priced lunch continued this week at the Rivington Grill in the Souk Al Bahar in the Dubai Old Town, actually one of the newest districts overlooking the Burj Dubai, the world’s tallest building.

The Business Lunch at the Rivington is keenly priced at AED80 for two courses and AED100 for three. I had an onion soup starter, very tasty but a bit slippery, and a chicken and mushroom pie.

Fish and chips

This is British brasserie fare. My companions ate fish and chips – with large, thick-cut chips so good that you have to steal one – and eel salad, not my cup of tea but the northern seaside speciality. To be fair only I stuck to the Business Lunch, the other dishes cost rather more.

The menu features British oddities like baked beans on toast and cheese on toast as well as Scottish oysters and tea cakes. But if this is what you like it is pretty good.

The food we gave a thumbs up, the wine I did not like terribly much. A cheap Sicilian white Grecanico 2008, Cusumano gave a rather unpleasant aftertaste, so I upgraded to a tolerable French Macon-Lugny 2006 at twice the price.

For ambience the Rivington is more New York than London. On the other hand, it is small enough to be considered intimate and smart enough for a visiting CEO. Service, while nothing special, did not disappoint either.

Puddings, as the British call desserts, again touched more on the pub menu than fine dining with banoffee pudding, bread and butter pudding, Eton Mess, apple crumble and an English cheese board.

Pudding for desert

We could not find room for a pudding but a glance across a neighboring table revealed satisfied customers.

You could argue that for nicely presented pub grub this is actually a bit over-priced. Some of the meals could be easily prepared by most people at home for a fraction of the restaurant cost.

Surely if you eat out you want to experience something different, perhaps a style or variety of food you can not normally enjoy. That said the Business Lunch was pleasant enough, although the wine less so.