Cayena Redux

About a year ago, I wrote about Cayena Latin Fusion in Nicosia. My initial review of the restaurant was average and somehow elicited an onslaught of comments from various readers on both the strengths and weaknesses of the place. Since the review steered so many people towards my blog, part of me felt indebted to the restaurant. Another part of me—that one enamored with Latin American food—wanted to give Cayena a second chance, hoping this time around I would fully indulge in the flavors of my childhood. Upon hearing from acquaintances that the chef had changed and the operation had improved, I booked a table for myself, The Wife, Ph.D., and My Zolpidem Supplier, soon to be re-baptized as The Third Wheel or Our Violinist.

It's impressive what Chef Malcolm Emmanueil, who gained invaluable experience working under Brazilian chef Alex Atala at D.O.M. and Gordon Ramsey's protege Angela Hartnett at The Connaught in London, has accomplished in little less than a year. That night, the service was practically flawless—dishes were brought out at a good pace and the waitstaff was extremely attentive, even offering to decant our bottle of 2009 Marques de Griñon Rioja, a first for me here on The Rock. The food was also excellent and adapted well to Cypriot palates, appetites (large portions!) and pricing preferences. It's still not 100% Latino but I do believe Malcom's creative interpretations of the different dishes are quite faithful to our cuisine.

As appetizers, we shared the fried cod cakes, stuffed with cheese and served with chimichurri, and a Peruvian-style ceviche (for safety reasons, the fish was poached for thirty seconds and then tossed with the lemon juice, onions and spice) that was refreshing, full of briny, tangy flavors and matched with sweet potatoes, corn and avocado wedges. I then had the feijoada, essentially a deconstructed version of the original with a heavy focus on the meats, food of choice for 87.34% of The Rock's population according to statistics I unearthed from the clutter at the Ministry of Meze. It's served as a mixed grill (spare ribs, chicken breast, pork chop, pork loin and a delectable homemade linguica, all perfectly grilled) on a mattress of sauteed cabbage with a night-table of stewed black beans, white rice and a yummy farofa including coconut flakes that gave it a unique flavor. The Wife, Ph.D., faithful to her (yaaawn!) pescetarianism, ordered the moqueca, which was far superior to its previous incarnation. Again deconstructed, the crispy salmon, white fish, mussels and prawns, laid out on a long plate, were topped with a tomato, fresh herbs and coconut milk sauce that was lighter yet tastier than what I recall. My Zolpidem Supplier, reveling in her new role, had medium-rare Peruvian beef anticuchos that were juicy and only a bit spicy. Overall, a vast improvement from our first experience at Cayena.

Yes, dear readers, I know I promised you a fajitas showdown between Cayena and Los Bandidos in Agia Napa. Don't worry, it will eventually come. Then again, why focus on Tex-Mex when I can go really south of the border?

Whine On The Rocks' (Revised) Rating: 4.5 out of 5 Sparkling Spatulas

Juggling Act

Sometimes I fancy myself the bearded onion chopper or knife-sharpening tinker to Ecuadorian-American Iron Chef Jose Garces. On those days when my delusions of grandeur have hit I-deserve-a-James-Beard-Award levels, I come up with silly ideas such as plucking and disemboweling half-a-dozen quails or, in this case, hosting a multiple-course dinner for a select few of my fancy friends. The Wife, Ph.D., who's sucked in by my condition and embraces its symptoms out of solidarity, even baptized the dinner as Mateo's Mini Bar, a self-serving yet completely ludicrous reference to the acclaimed Jose Andres restaurant in Washington, DC. She then proceeded to pull out a notepad (she's a Virgo and making lists comes second to over-analysis in her long list of favorite pastimes), we designed a menu consisting of thirteen dishes and chose the three fortunate souls (My Zolpidem Supplier, The Disney-Obsessed Man-Child and Minnie Mouse) that would have to suffer through my alcohol-fueled, ingredient-juggling kitchen act.

It all went down a Saturday night. I spent too many hours in my Chef Guevara t-shirt and Las Catrinas apron chopping, slicing, dicing, peeling, blending, sauteing, boiling, stirring and washing. By the end of the night, the kitchen was a war zone. Pots, pans, spatulas, wooden spoons and measuring cups stacked up in the sink like rubble after a loud explosion. Oil, tomato paste, balsamic vinegar, lemon juice and red wine splattered the gray tiles and white walls. Cook books (Diana Kennedy, Claudia Roden, Marcella Hazan, Williams-Sonoma, Green & Black's and Michelle O. Fried) and old issues of Bon Appetite and Gourmet magazines sat to a side like idle, tired tanks. Despite the exhaustion and ridiculous amounts of food (we never made it to the cheese platter and only island wine available that night), the four-hour meal was a success. Around one-thirty a.m., The Wife, Ph.D., fearing the worst, politely dismissed our guests after the Disney-Obsessed Man-Child nudged me into sharing a chilled bottle of Sierra Nevada Torpedo Extra IPA for "digestive" purposes. As a good friend of mine says, "Mateo, you have the willpower of a slut."

Here's the menu:

Amuse Bouche (Date Wrapped in Bacon & Buffalo Mozzarella with Uvillas)

Endive, Tangerine, Goat Cheese & Slivered Almond Salad 

("Adapted" from Jose Andres' Jaleo in DC)

Gazpacho with Cucumber & Hearts of Palm Relish

Garbanzo Tabbouleh with Pitta Chips

Peruvian Prawn Causita

Mexican Perch Cebiche with Crispy Plantains

Crab-Cake with Tomato, Red Onion & Mango Salsa

Lemon Sorbet 

(Store-bought since I was too lazy to make a granita)

Prosciutto & Pear Salad with Fresh Mint & Sherry Vinaigrette

Portuguese Chicken Stew with Quinua Carrot Cakes

Slow-Roasted Pork Loin in Milk with Balsamic Sweet Potato Mash

Polenta Chocolate Cake

Cheese Platter with Vin Santo from Santorini

2009 Domaine Gerovassiliou Malagousia (Epanomi, Greece) - This wine was awarded a Gold Medal at the 2010 Decanter World Wine Awards. Pears, green apples, citrus, peaches and flowers on the nose. Balanced, very smooth and complete wine. 90/100.

2006 Muga Rioja Reserva (70% Tempranillo, 20% Granacha and 10% Graziano & Mazuelo) - Cherry, plums, raspberry, vanilla, smoke and pepper on the nose. Taste-wise, sour cherries predominate. Decent effort. 87/100.

Kir Royale With Cheese

I am not too fond of mixed drinks. Back in my teens and twenties, when I was naive and far from a purist, I didn't have a problem walking up to a bar and ordering a Mojito, Margarita, vanilla Stolichnaya and Coke, Cuba Libre or Tom Collins with a splash of Cointreau. Now, however, I cringe at the thought of alcohol sharing a tumbler with juice or soft drinks or other less palatable liqueurs. I actually find it insulting since alcohol--be it whiskey, rum, tequila or vodka--should be served neat or (worst-case scenario) on the rocks. Hence, I prefer to stick to beer and wine (and whiskey on ice at weddings since its powers gets me moonwalking, spinning, flailing my arms and grabbing my crotch on the dance floor in no time.)

So you can only imagine my dismay when several weeks ago I walked into Silver Star to find My Zolpidem Supplier and her cousin each merrily sipping on a Kir Royale, a champagne and creme de cassis concoction. It's a wine bar, for God's sake! I whined. Then I foolishly realized they were waiting for The Wife, Ph.D., and me to select a bottle considering my faux expertise, which at the end of the night proved to be just that: a fraud. But, in my defense, the establishment did not help my case as purported wine authority among my fancy friends.

Silver Star Wine Bar is owned by Cava Nostra and is located in downtown Nicosia right across the street from the wine retail shop. According to the Brother-in-Law, the bar is housed in a former watering hole for call girls, horny patrons and other seedy characters. The pleasant outside smoking area consists of a few old oak barrels set on their sides to serve as tables, some stools and heat lamps. The inside, however, seems to have only been cosmetically retouched and remains a melange of Asian-inspired, Art Deco, Southwestern (Cowboy) and minimalist styles. I surmise that little thought went into decorating (God forbid renovating) and transforming the space into a thematically-consistent one. One room has a tall long table with a few stools and three lower tables in the back corner where a bright-lit silver-ish star hangs on the wall. The other room is dominated by a bar with a blue backdrop and mirrors, some scattered plants and what I think is a traditional Japanese umbrella hanging from the ceiling. Worst of all, the floors of the place, old fashioned spotted tiles vaguely reminiscent of hospital floors, add to the helter skelter.

Now to the crux of the matter: the wine list. Very underwhelming for a bar that is owned by a wine shop located just a short hop, skip and jump away. One would think that with access to an entire cellar one would have a lot more than roughly 25 bottles to pick from. The wine shop was open when we visited Silver Star so maybe we could have stumbled in, chosen a bottle not listed in the bar's menu and uncorked it across the street without the usual price markup. If this is the case, then it should be advertised somewhere since such an option would be awfully attractive to a broad spectrum of wine lovers.

We started off with either the 2006 or 2007 (The Wife, Ph.D., was note-taking and in her drunken stupor she mistakenly jotted down 2010, an impossibility unless we have access to a pimped-out Delorean DMC-12) Gran Sangre de Toro Reserva, a Garnacha Tinta, Mazuelo or Carignan, and Shiraz blend from Spain. Nose-wise, the wine was all over the place: charcoal, leather, guava, barnyard, herds of sheep under a light drizzle, pepper and burnt popcorn. In what will go down as one of the best vinous descriptors in the short history of this blog, My Zolpidem Supplier's cousin described the wine as smelling "like a dirty moist mop head and a brand new car." Taste-wise, it was dominated by red fruit and earth and really failed to tickle our palates.

The girls were so disappointed that I was rushed into picking a second bottle just to tone down their tongue-lashing. Continuing with the evening's Spanish theme, I selected the 2006 Marques de Riscal Reserva, a Tempranillo, Graciano and Mazuelo or Carignan blend, and again I let them down. I felt like the dorky bespectacled college freshman who gets a second chance in the backseat of a Honda CRV with the college's hot svelte head cheerleader and repeatedly stalls when transitioning from first to second gear and putters to a stop due to a massive oil leak. The wine had touches of red fruit, wet earth, dust, vanilla, cinnamon and dark chocolate, as well as green components including green peppers and spinach according to one of my female companions. So memorable that The Wife, Ph.D., and I enjoyably doused ourselves in the bull's blood.

By the end of the night, I slouched in that back room with my head down contemplating my demise. I had disappointed my wife and her friends. Perhaps it was time for me to abandon wine and focus instead on my forehand, serve and volleys, or develop a potent left-footed shot a la Roberto Carlos. Or possibly I am meant to escape to Madrid to live among my kind and study the role of religion in the lives of bereft Ecuadorian immigrants. Then again, maybe all life was trying to tell me that gloomy night was that sometimes a mixed drink doesn't sound so bad after all.

Whine On The Rocks Rating: 3 (On Potential Alone) Out Of 5 Sparkling Spatulas