The Anantara Beach resort only opened in September, but although its restaurant offerings aren’t yet complete (an Aussie grill was still to open when we visited), it’s already made a distinctly Asian mark on the East Crescent.
The night we visited, we were treated to a three-venue tour of the resort’s culinary hotspots: Canapes on the shisha terrace, mains in the Mekong restaurant and dessert in the beach-side Beach House restaurant.
I’m not normally one to get excited about canapes, and tonight was no different. A canape is a canape at the end of the day, though all the necessary luxury boxes were ticked, with lobster making an appearance and some of the finest prawn crackers I’ve ever tasted (I could actually have eaten these all night, so on reflection maybe I did get just a little bit excited about canapes.) The relaxed setting on the terrace surrounded by the resort’s ambling landscaped grounds added an extra something.
The mains in Mekong were excellent. A quick interrogation of regional director David Garner as to why the menu seemed predominantly Thai, when the Mekong is probably most famous for its delta appearing in every Vietnam film ever, revealed that the restaurant seeks to offer cuisine from all the countries the fluvial equivalent of Harry Dean Stanton passes through, mainly focusing on Thailand, Vietnam and China.
We were treated to a selection of the restaurant’s signature dishes, and although I wasn’t sure exactly what they all were thanks to the whistle stop tour nature of the evening, the duck deserves a special mention here. Top prize however, I’m ashamed to say, went to the sticky toffee pudding in Beach House. Deliciously moist and chewy with a crispy sugar top, and eaten with the waters of the Gulf lapping the shore just feet away.
The food was only half the experience, however, and a huge vote of confidence has to go to the location. The resort has actively avoided the usual Dubai cliches of towering blocks and bustling activity. Its low rise villas are spread across a vast Thai-themed garden, all interconnected by a 10,000 sq metre lagoon pool. The ground floor rooms have direct access, while the first floor rooms have balconies overlooking it.
Even travelling around the sprawling grounds takes place in a tuk tuk rather than the traditional golf cart. Admittedly it’s an electric tuk tuk, so the journey is somewhat more relaxing than the equivalent in Hanoi or Bangkok, but it’s a nice touch and shows the hotel has given some thought beyond the pagoda-style buildings and excellent prawn crackers when coming up with its Thai theme.
In fact, by the end of the evening I only had one major complaint, and that’s that I wasn’t staying there.
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