Don’t you just hate it when you’re faced with the “Where-do-you-want-to-eat?-Anywhere.” conundrum? H and I were at Greenbelt last Sunday and once again we found ourselves having that problem. She didn’t want anything in particular (typical), while my only requirement was that the place shouldn’t be overflowing with diners (again, typical).
I think we’ve spent a good half hour trying to look for a place to have dinner until we came across Fish out of Water. It’s a seafood restaurant we’ve spotted before but have never eaten at. At that time, there was also only one couple inside. Jackpot!
Fish out of Water: Spectacular seafood recipes and stories by Red Crab
(Author’s note: H has this theory that we attract customers to a food place whenever we come in. True enough, after we’ve settled and placed our orders, two families – clans pa nga yata – came in and the resto was packed. Amazing.)
The first dish we had was the rock lobster salad below. The menu describes the dish as salad greens, cashew nuts, sliced tomato, black olives, grilled lobster in crème fraiche dressing.
Creme fraiche = fresh cream. Fancy schmanzy. :)
The main flaw of what we had were the quality of the leaves. At first glance, the deep greens and bright purples were inviting. Unfortunately, they were limp and offered no resistance to the bite. Maybe it took a lot of beating around the spinner? Too bad because the grilled rock lobster was stellar – sweet and smoky, albeit on the “bitin” side – and the dressing’s acidity was spot on.
I got reminded of when Carlos was eliminated on the Thanksgiving episode of Top Chef Season 2. If I remember correctly, it was either Tom Collichio or Anthony Bourdain who mentioned that while it seems making a good salad is trivial, it isn’t. The salad we had could have been one example.
Good thing the second dish was extremely sapid. It was Maya maya fish head (s. There were four servings. :)) simmered in coconut Malaysian sambal curry with mixed tropical fruits and vegetables. It was one of the better and more memorable curry dishes I’ve tasted so far – and that’s saying a lot since I almost had one on a daily basis for three weeks back in Chennai. It leaned more on the saccharine side of the curry spectrum but it still had that right kick of heat that one comes to expect from the said dish. The tropical fruits and vegetables were a spin to the usual mélange you’d find in a curry: chunks of potatoes, eggplants, bell peppers, pineapples, and cucumber. Of the three dishes we had that night, it was the clear winner. I really, really liked it.
This curry was as flavorful as it was unphotogenic.
The menu said the fish was simmered but it didn’t mention if it was fried beforehand, something I suspect could be the case because of the texture of the skin. Regardless, the fish remained tender and succulent. That was great since I love fish cheeks (or heads, for that matter). I think second to the fish belly, that’s the sea creature’s most flavorful part.
The third and final dish we had was the Malaysian sweet chili prawns. It was prawns sautéed in a bright sweet chili plum and lime coriander butter sauce.
I can’t recall who told me this (probably my mom or my lola) but I was taught that one way to determine the freshness of cooked shrimp is how easy (or difficult) it is to de-shell. If I had to apply that rule, then I’d say the prawns we had that night were not the freshest. (Can anyone validate that? Is that one of those old wives’ tale?) The shells were a pain to remove. The meat was bordering on overcooked too, which was a bit of a downer.
The prawns were sizeable but were not humongous.
The dish’s redeeming factor was the sauce. It was refreshing to the palate, and was nothing similar to what I’ve tasted before. The coming together of chilies, plum, lime, coriander and butter was sublime. To be honest, it tasted weird when we first tasted it, but after a bite with the prawns, it was awesome.
The servings at Fish out of Water were reasonable relative to the price. Read: good for sharing. With that, we were both full after three dishes. I thought it was good to try one of the two interesting dessert choices, though. It was a toss-up between a caffeinated cheesecake and Laguna white cheese-lime cheesecake. We got the former.
The Barako cheesecake was pretty, at best. It wasn’t awful, but it wasn’t extraordinary either. It was light and had the consistency I prefer (gelatinous as opposed to firm) and had the hints of coffee that the cheesecake’s name suggested. That was where I was disappointed the most: I was expecting a strong hit of the Barako coffee but I was given just a hint. I also recall the sensation of a small gelatin blob in one of the bites I took. Eep. Not good. I looked around and it seems Anton agrees that the resto’s desserts are not something that you go there for.
More cheesecake than Barako.
And oh, we were feeling a bit fancy that night so we decided to try the house white wine. A bit strong for H’s liking but I think it paired well with seafood. It was a Butterfly Ridge Colombard Chardonnay from Australia. The menu’s description says: on the medium to full palate lemony citrus characters with some passion fruit and peach. Anyone else here thinks “lemony citrusy” seems redundant?
White and strong. Likes this. :)
We’d probably go back here to try out the crabs (FooW, after all, is a member of the Red Crab group of restaurants), a lobster main course and a cooked whole fish. For first timers though, I suggest you don’t skip on the fish head curry. Oh, don’t shy away from the complimentary toast bread and seafood spread (or was that a dip or a pate?). While the bread was nothing special, the pale pink delight that came with it was awesome. “It tastes like the sea.” were the only words I mustered when asked what I thought about it.
Awesome free stuff. Hehe.
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Postscript:
Props to FooW for the interiors and the concept. The restaurant was inviting and well-lit, and I thought the menu was well thought of. It runs the risk of being snobbed by common people like me because of its looks but first time diners may be pleasantly surprised of the dominantly Pinoy and Asian flavors the restaurant highlights.
Filed under: Food Tagged: Fish out of Water, Food finds, Pinoy, seafood
