Review | Chef Saby Gorai's Recca comes to Mumbai

At Recca Mumbai, Chef Saby Gorai uses terracotta pots to bake Armenian-style ravioli stuffed with lamb and smoky tomato broth.

You are going to have a problem if you go to Recca, because you are going to want to eat everything.

The menu seems to have been written by a hypnotist. Prawns crusted with popcorn? Yes. Pide bubbling with cheese and meats? Okay, that too. Sizzling kebabs made with Mediterranean spices and dangling seductively from skewers? Yeah, why not?

Popcorn prawns

Everything here is created using local Indian ingredients such as kalari cheese from Kashmir, bayberries from Uttarakhand, phodshi bhaji from Maharashtra, gourd from Kerala, badami aloo from Assam and other locally grown ingredients. The result is a loving, and delicious tribute to the rich and often underrated produce of India.

But much before the food arrives, Recca puts you at ease with its plush sink in sofas, aerial gardens and large bay windows that overlook the leafy Kala Ghoda precincts. The '70 and '80s playlist (think Abba, Bee Gees, Madonna, Whitney Houston, MJ) feels at once welcoming and familiar. 

I start with a delicious, rustic dip with sourdough and ciabatta. The roasted tomatoes, basil, garlic and kachampuli vinegar in olive oil are left on the table to muddle and enjoy. Spicy, tangy, umami…it’s a riot of flavours and colours.

The pide at Recca comes topped with a runny egg and crisply fried bacon. I devour the boat shaped pizza with gluttonous alacrity. I mean, what’s not to like about a dish that has fresh baked bread, melting cheese, bacon and a perfectly dropped egg? The vegetarian version with roasted vegetables is equally compelling.

Another exciting starter on the menu is dolma, where baby aubergines are stuffed with green peas, carrots, aged cheese and amaranth pops.

Non-vegetarians may be seduced with mustard-laced prawns presented in delicate onion shells. The tongue has fun rolling in all the sweetness from the onions and the punch from the mustard.

You could easily eat a full meal comprising just the starters here. But then you’d miss all the other good stuff on the menu. Like the claypot pasta. Gorai uses terracotta pots to bake Armenian-style ravioli that comes stuffed with lamb and whispering of smoky tomato broth. If you spring for just one main course, let it be this.

The most eye-catching dish at Recca has to go to the red wine prawns from the lava grill section. The artful construction of sea-fresh prawns on a bed of roasted tomatoes and pumpkin leaves you overawed. It’s served with a side of sweet potato mash and fiery red pepper sauce. The prawns are perfectly grilled to give them a mildly charred surface and juicy insides. So good.

Milk cake dessert

At Recca, you must save room for dessert - it serves a deliriously moist milk cake drenched in condensed milk and topped with meringue. Rajgira and white chocolate balls play supporting cast to deliver a stunning act.

Bar menu

The bar menu by Darell Mascarenhas overflows with surprises. As I bring my gin and tonic with clarified orange juice close to my lips, I notice something. The ice cubes hide edible flowers.

My whisky sour is smoked and spiked with homemade orange bitters. 

The service is friendly and chatty. Inquiries about the food sometimes elicit backstories. But thankfully they don’t act like helicopters at the table. Instead, they show up, smiles in place, only as necessary.

Where: 1st Floor, Kala Ghoda Society, 30, K Dubash Marg, Kala Ghoda, Fort, Mumbai.

Call: 91 84337 37344 or 84337 37366

Price for two: Rs 3,000