3 poor stars out of 5 for this place, alas.
We ate outside on a beautiful day, so I can't evaluate the interior, but the atmosphere outside isn't great. It is located in front of a Chinese shop in a not very beautiful street although it is a side street of Via Maestra. Sheet metal tables and chairs, rigid plastic placemats.
Commendable service, the girl served us very well (it must be said that the place was almost empty, we were the only ones outside and I think only one table was occupied inside) and she was very smiling the whole time, often asking us if we were Well.
The food is carefully presented, interesting in its ideas, but too spoiled by the new modern trends that make the dishes soulless. I had the marinated trout with soy mayonnaise and passion fruit. Good trout (not very marinated) and well cut, but perhaps 30 grams on the plate; I imagine the sauces delicious but in such ridiculous quantities (small drops scattered on the plate) that I struggle to understand what they actually tasted like; indistinguishable passion fruit, indistinguishable soy mayonnaise. My mother had the poached egg with pecorino cream and crispy bacon. Very nice dish decorated with a flavored green oil (I don't know with what), but the egg was substantially raw with the raw egg white floating on the plate, the pecorino cream was very light in both flavor and consistency, certainly made with a lot of cream and I don't know how many cans of gas in the siphon, because the "cream" was basically air, so much so that after just one minute the level of cream on the plate had dropped by half without having touched it, a fondue would have made the dish perhaps less gormet , but certainly better; crispy bacon not received. We asked the waitress (very kind) and she told us that it was inside the cream, perhaps it was also true, but the flavor was not noticeable and in any case I don't find sense in putting something crunchy to soak in a liquid.
Next I had the entrecote, requested rare, with potato millefeuille and café de paris. Sliced entrecote, small portion, not very tasty, little Maillard, very hard to chew and a little ahead of cooking. Forgettable potato millefeuille, café de paris (a sort of whipped butter rich in aromas and herbs) exceptional. My mother had the braised cheek with creamed potatoes and carrots. Good, tender cheek, not the flavor bomb I've tasted elsewhere, but certainly the best-crafted dish; good potato cream and carrots.. carrots. The fact that the only truly good and well-made dish was the traditional one is emblematic.
To finish we shared a "reinterpretation of the bunet" with caramel cream and dark chocolate covering, which in theory, according to the waitress, should have "cracked" by breaking it with a teaspoon. In reality it was a less than decent dessert. It looked like a soggy bunet with other soggy textures above or below (I don't even remember), the flavor of the caramel mixed in a bit with everything and the dark covering absolutely not crunchy nor with a distinguishable flavor from the rest. I love reinterpretations, but if they improve the traditional dish or if they vary it in a sensible way, they don't make it worse. I have eaten a thousand traditional bunets in my life, and each of those thousand was better and more complex in flavor (despite being made with 4 ingredients in crosses) than this one.
Drank a Coke, a water and a glass of Alta Langa. No coffee, no aperitif and no entrée offered.
€100 of shopping, maybe we're not used to the prices in Alba, but a starter and a second course for two plus a dessert split for €100 seems crazy to me, also considering the small portions and the dishes which in the end were perfectly normal. The €8 for the glass of Alta Langa was disappointing when we had simply asked for a glass of sparkling wine, the €4 for a can but above all the €7 for two place settings having eaten on a plastic placemat and having received 5 counted breadsticks and 4 slices of warm bread.
diego “diegogive” piumatti
.
01 Novembre 2024
6,0
On October 19th, my birthday, while walking around Alba we stopped at this restaurant almost by chance.
We found a welcoming, classy environment and very kind staff.
The food was delicious and very well presented.
When returning to Alba we will certainly return to eat at "Momenti Gourmet"
Simona Giora
.
21 Ottobre 2024
10,0