Ed Eats

Naar Restobar
Main Street, Balluta Bay,
St Julians
+356 2137 3412

Food: 5/10
Service: 6/10
Ambience: 9/10
Value: 8/10
Overall: 7/10

The year ended and another one started in a flurry of reflections and resolutions. I’m never one to update my resolve when an arbitrary date comes around. I’m on a permanent quest to experience new flavours and this is something of a never-ending journey. There’s so much to eat and our lives are so dismally short that I find myself cramming culinary experiences.

I understand that this isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. I was having a chat with a couple of the lovely people at the office and, it turns out, that even in a space filled with unashamed gluttons, not everyone is willing to stray outside a comfort zone. The word ‘comfort’ is quite the operative one here. For most, if there’s something we know we like, there’s little reason to stray from it.

When I’m in the mood for comfort food, I stick to the basics. As unimaginative as fresh bread with tomatoes and an excellent olive oil may sound, there’s little that can go wrong and the comfort it affords is guaranteed. For the rest of it, I seek flavours, colours, textures, temperatures and unusual combinations of all these to stimulate my olfactory imagination.

For quite a while, dining out in Malta was a relatively boring affair. Over the last few years, however, we seem to have started to play catch-up with the rest of the developed world and are seeking culinary themes from beyond our tiny shores. Who would have thought that a town like Gżira, for instance, would play host to practically every continent’s kitchen?

With my unending search in mind, I thought long and hard before picking a place to eat that would set the tone for the new year. There’s this restaurant that I’ve been curious about, mainly because of its location. It is perched just above the Neptunes waterpolo club in St Julians and has contributed to the general aesthetic of the place. It’s been designed tastefully and put together in a way that shows little care for expense. I was also intrigued by the name, liking the curiosity that an unusual and allegorical word can lend to a restaurant.

The gorgeous weather that seems to want to stick around for a while sealed the decision. All it would take is long sleeves to have lunch al fresco and enjoy the views of Balluta bay and open seas beyond that.

When we arrived, the guys running the front of house didn’t quite seem to know what to do. Eventually, the man whom I took to be the manager acknowledged us and said we could pick any unoccupied table on the terrace.

While we sat, three team members passed by and, I assumed, they all thought we were waiting for food. This was impossible without a menu, so I eventually asked for one and was pleased I did so. Someone with a healthy dose of imagination has worked on their contents and this helped build more anticipation. There’s plenty to choose from and they’ve catered for those up for a quick snack as well as those seeking a more complete meal. That’s perfect for this sort of location because I’d love to be able to pop by for a rapid meal.

Fritto Misto

I was in no particular hurry, though, so I decided to have at least two courses. For starters, it was a toss between the fritto misto (comfort zone) or the Thai octopus with Chorizo (exciting prospect) so I chose in favour of excitement. Luckily, it took very gentle convincing for the better half to go with the fritto misto.

For mains, she went with a crispy beef salad. I smelled resolutions but had the good sense to keep my mouth shut about this. I was tempted by the Loup de Mer’ a fillet of sea bass with a cuttlefish ink sauce on top. Even if it isn’t the best time for fresh fish, the farmed sea bass is plentiful all year and, being much fattier than its wild counterpart, is hard to mess up unless overcooked.

Having returned from a few days of overindulgence in a land that speaks foreign, I reluctantly left wine off the table. This turned out to be quite the mistake because our starters took just over half an hour to make it to our table. By the time our main course arrived, the sun had all but set behind the monstrous hotel that stains the bay. Sitting with the hotel to your back, however, is a rare treat. From the gorgeous Balluta buildings to your right and all the way to Barracuda is the only unspoilt stretch of seafront left in Sliema. Wear imaginary blinkers, and you’re isolated from the vertical insanity that makes up the rest of the coastline.

A little attention to process is all it will take to reach the finishing line

Service is a little bumbling. The man who served us, going by the name of Vladimir, was a gem. He was helpful, polite, just as friendly as he should be, and was doing all he could to make our stay as pleasant as possible. But one great dancer does not make a ballet. The choreography suffered, so his colleagues brought drinks that weren’t ours, asked whether we wanted to have our orders taken, and forgot our order for a second bottle of water.

When our food turned up, it looked the part. Presentation is tidy and attractive and both starters were served together and at a reasonable temperature. I couldn’t decide whether my dish was lazy or just the result of excessive cost-consciousness in the kitchen. The chorizo was of the variety that’s bought in pre-sliced discs and had been cut into quarters. The octopus was tough and there was no hint of the Thai I was promised. Well, I suppose you could count the chilli as being Thai, but there’s nothing to separate it from the heat that comes from the chorizo.

Luckily, the fritto misto had been very well fried, so it was dry and crisp on the outside and pleasantly moist inside. Prawns, cuttlefish, and squid were served on top of a green salad and inside their own pretty, copper pan. Nothing had been cooked from fresh but it isn’t the season for that. The batter was deftly seasoned, with a hint of white pepper adding fragrance, but most of it fell off by the time half the dish was eaten. I wasn’t complaining and lapped up the morsels the better half left behind.

The main courses took less time and I was thankful for this. The two halves of the fillet had been arranged at a jaunty angle, so one overlapped the other. They’d been so overcooked that they’d stuck together and had all but dried out. The rest of the dish saved the day, with excellent roasted veg, twice-cooked potatoes and a delicious, cold couscous. I simply ate my way around the fish.

The beef on the crispy beef salad was actually very well-prepared. It is so often that crispy beef ends up having the texture of fried bootlace, that I was pleasantly surprised with Naar’s take on it, having a crisp exterior while retaining a moist inside. There was precious little of it, atop a nearly naked salad, though, so the dish wasn’t as inspired as its description had promised.

By this time there was no way I was waiting for dessert. Vladimir turned up when we’d asked for the bill and offered us coffee. He appeared mortified that I’d left my fish behind and asked whether all was well. I accepted his gracious offer of coffee but wouldn’t go into detail about the food. The man had gone out of his way already and it was the rest of the team that needed some coordination.

With a bill of €55, it felt to me like there is plenty of effort being made to keep the price as reasonable as possible, even if this doesn’t always translate to winning in the kitchen. Naar is running a race it can easily win, based on the location, the restaurant itself, and the imagination in the kitchen. A little attention to process is all it will take to reach the finishing line. In the meantime I’ll return for the views, a cold beer and that fritto misto. As long as I’m not in a hurry.

You can send e-mails about this column to edeats@gmail.com.