Rossini's at Sheraton Grande Sukhumvit Hotel

It was just after lunch time when I checked in and it was pouring outside so I was minded to find some grub in the hotel. I'd read about the award-winning restaurant Rossini's which just happened to be in this hotel so I decided to check out the place. To my delight, there was a signboard outside the restaurant advertising its Power Lunch, which looked really affordable at 690 (2 courses)/780 Baht (3 courses)(excluding taxes of course). Getting a seat for lunch on a wet Thursday afternoon did not pose much of a problem and the staff were attentive and spoke good English.

After I'd placed my order, the complimentary bread of basket arrived with some olives. No butter. I wonder why (but in any case I asked for some). And they also served a trio of flat lollipop-looking biscuits with nuts stuck on them. Forget the bread - that was nothing extraordinary but those biscuits things, they were just the right mix of sweet and crunchiness, the kind that leaves no cloying sweet aftertaste in your mouth, and not hard enough to hurt your teeth.

The waitress followed up with a complimentary beetroot mousse. Now, I hate beetroot but since this was free...well, it proved to be pretty alright with little bits of potato at the end.

I ordered the Seafood Salad for my appetizer and it came with all of 1 scallop, 1 squid, 1 mussel and 1 prawn. Fresh, presented well but...I would try some other starter if I'd the chance to go back. Even knowing that this was Rossini's did not raise this dish in my humble esteem.

I ordered the veal pansotti with parmesan cheese sauce as my main. It was a toss up between the veal and the snapper with black truffle sauce and it was only because the server strongly recommended the veal that I decided against the snapper (Which I will have the next time I go back to BKK).

Well, the dish looked like this when served - 3 lumps of yellow, green and brown. I'll give this dish a really low score for presentation. Just because it is a set lunch menu doesn't mean that you can depart with the aesthetics altogether, ya know?

But presentation aside, the whipped potato and the spinach heaps melted delightfully in the mouth and the veal was just awesome. Juicy, succulent, tender and done in a way such that each bite of the veal meant a mini-explosion of flavor in the mouth.

Dessert was the orange and pistachio cake. It was blah. Nothing to crow about - the cake was not too moist or too dry but it lacked the richness of a really delicious cake. I would not order this again.

Based on my experiences of having set lunches at better restaurants (even the celebrity restaurants in Singapore's MBS), I wouldn't be quite so quick to belittle my experience at Rossini's. However, I think that one should order from the ala carte menu to be able to truly judge the quality of the dishes of a restaurant.

And the power lunch (not very much food, was it?) cost a total of 918 Baht (about SGD 36?) after taxes. The Slog Reviews: 7.5/10 for this experience, and hoping to have a better experience at Rossini's the next time.