Delightful D'Arry's

What better place to bring your family and friends for a meal in Cambridge?

I know, I know, I'm raving about d'Arry's again! Cause it's simply the place to impress, whether it's to show off British cuisine in a non conventional way, or that Cambridge is just not another nerdy town with pub grub and kebab stalls only :P

Graduation lunch here with my family and Yan provided the avenue for us (mainly me) to provide a more objective review of their main courses. All of us went for their main instead of lunch menu which only consist of lighter meals like sandwiches and wraps. My oh my, their menu didn't disappoint.

Ready to feast with your hungry eyes, mind and soul??

I chose Fish Pie (£10.80) which is a combination of salmon, smoked haddock and prawns on a bed of spinach, baked in a fresh and creamy white wine butter sauce with Parmesan herb crusted top, served with beautifully roasted baby new potatoes and seasonal vegetables. Yes, everything about it sounds evil with cream and dairy overdosage, ah well, it's graduation :P I'd have preferred a crustier top though, and given their extensive menu, I'd say that there are better options out there. However, their roast potatoes are to die for ...

K ordered Fish of the Day, which was Grilled Sea Bream on a bed of roasted seasonal greens. Look at the picture. Never have I seen such a beautiful masterpiece. Not only beautiful by sight, it was also grilled to perfection, with it's succulent texture and crispy skin lightly seasoned with salt.

I'd love to be able to do this dish in the future since seafood is my favorite thing. Something simple yet with such powerful impact if done perfectly ...

M had the Bacon and Barbecue Chicken (£ 8.95), which was reviewed in my previous post on d'Arry's. This is a safe bet with chicken breast grilled with a bacon rasher (to prevent dryness), BBQ sauce and melted Cheddar cheese, served with chunky chips and seasonal vegetables. The sauce was still good with a gooey consistency, something like sweet and sour sauce with extra cheesiness :) I absolutely love the chunky chips, their presentation makes big fries trendy again!

G had the 12 oz Scotch Rib-eye Steak (£ 13.95), grilled on demand with chunky chips, roast tomato, onion rings, seasonal vegetables with peppercorn sauce. Needless to comment on how it tasted like as the dish was finished pretty quickly, a big complement coming from a rather picky eater! However, I can't believe he didn't touch the onion rings! I'm not much of a fan as well I must say, but look at those irresistible onion rings and how can you not at least try them?! Boys ... :P

D had the special Dish of the Day, written on the blackboard. I don't exactly remember the name, but all I recalled was that he ordered Pan fried Shark Meat, how cool is that! It was served with some sort of sauce and vegetable dressing, with a purple potato timbales beautifully decorated on the side.

Ok, I might have just said a confusing and incomprehensible sentence. Let me explain ...

The Purple potatoes itself are uniquely of Peruvian origin. They are a smaller oval-shaped potato with a purplish black outer skin and vivid purple, dense inner 'meat'. I so love it when you have 'odd' colored food which add a special dimension to a dish! However, I learn that they are less flavorful as other potato varieties and tend to get mushy if overcooked. On the other hand, timbales is a cylindrical metal drum which are played with 2 sticks, seems to be common in European/Latin American culture, if I'm not mistaken. Hence the purple potato is shaped like a timbales in the picture below. Now you know what it means if you see the word timbales (pronounced teem-bah-les) in the menu of a fancy restaurant :) This dish received a thumbs up from D.

Yan's choice was also from the blackboard, this was her Shepherd's Pie served with lightly roasted asparagus and root vegetables (carrots, parsnips and purple radish). Highly suspect that purple may be a trendy food color or something :P Anyway, I liked the brown colored sauce dressing. The pie was really good and the vegetables nicely balanced out the gamey taste of the pie.

It was a good lunch fare for a special occasion. Definitely a day to remember ...

Lunch was beautiful :)