Mesa

Another rainy day. Yawn. My friend U and I decided to indulge a little and off we went to Mesa. U is such a creature of habit (nothing wrong though) she ordered the exact same things she had last time! I was convinced she did it so she could eat her food right away without waiting for me to take a picture first. :-)

My starter: crisp salt and pepper calamari, marinated beetroot & cucumber with sweet chili mayo. The squid was very fresh and peppery. A nice change from the dreadful ones in Zapata's(think rubbery, wet, batter falling off), but then the free margaritas make up for it. The beet root didn't have too much taste, and the mayo didn't really taste of chili. Mind you I really didn't feel like I needed anything on the side - I would have been happy just eating (loads of) squid on its own.

I had the Tuscan bean cassoulet with crisp confit & roast garlic mash. While the bean cassoulet was forgettable, the mash was very creamy and not garlicky at all as I had feared. The duck was bursting with flavours and tender. Although I didn't eat the skin I could tell that it was really crispy.

I got to try the flourless Valrhona chocolate cake with butterscotch cream & mixed berry compote this time. The cake was out of this world. Very fluffy yet chocolaty. The fact that it was made without flour made it very different from the usual spongy cake texture and we loved it. I wished there was ice cream on the side though because the butterscotch cream was merely whipped cream with ONE drop of butterscotch on top. No quite what I was expecting. The mixed cherry compote tasted rather boozy, and we didn't really think much of it.

The damage came to RMB381 with two 3-course set lunches (RMB128) and 2 glasses of wine.

Mesa

748 Julu Rd. (near Fumin Rd), Shanghai. Tel: 6289-9108