Spice Up Your Life | Market Kitchen

“Spice up your life, People of the world, Spice up your life, aahh.” The Spice Girls

I think it’s quite firmly established that I am a big fan of the Market Kitchen restaurant at the Le Royal Méridien here in Abu Dhabi, so I’m always thrilled to be invited to one of their events. Their latest soiree was to sample some cuisine from Spice Market London, Market Kitchen’s founder Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s sister restaurant.

Spice Market London’s Executive Chef, Peter Lloyd, was visiting Abu Dhabi as part of the Abu Dhabi Food Festival to launch and showcase the menu that gives the capital’s residents the opportunity to sample some of the restaurants mouth-watering take on Southeast Asian ‘street food’. Vongerichten was first influenced by the colourful, flavoursome and fragrant cuisine found at Vietnamese street markets and Thai Food stalls whilst travelling in South East Asia. Spice Market’s concept is based on family-style dining where guests share a range of dishes placed in the middle of the table that continually arrive throughout the meal.

Spice Market London, as the name suggests is all about the flavours and spices of the food and the restaurant in London, located in the W Hotel, has a spice cabinet that spans two floors, is twenty-four meters long and reveals an array of ingredients that the chefs use to create dishes that gives the cuisine that extra flavoursome punch. Chef Lloyd launched the special programme with a series of events presenting his cuisine and now the capital’s residents have an unique opportunity to enjoy some of the iconic brand’s fabulous on a special menu for the next couple of weeks.

We enjoyed a selection from the menu including Shaved Yellowfin Tuna with coconut lime broth black pepper shrimp and sun dried pineapple jicama, Mango Salad with charred long beans and candied tamarind and Chili rubbed beef satay with thai basil and lime, Roasted cod fish with Malaysian chilli sauce and Char-grilled chicken with kumquat lemongrass dressing. With my sweet tooth, I particularity liked the Ovaltine kulfi ® and the colourful Thai jewels and fruit. Click here to view the whole menu.

FullSizeRender-11 Le Royal Méridien Abu Dhabi General Manager Shaun Parsons said: “We’re very excited to be participating in the first ever Abu Dhabi Food Festival, and inviting Chef Peter Lloyd from Spice Market London is an exciting opportunity for us to collaborate with an internationally renowned restaurant brand.” (As told to www.hoteliermiddleeast.com)

Spice Market London’s Executive Chef Peter Lloyd (source: www.leroyalmeridienabudhabi.com)

The menu may have been different but the venue, the awesome welcome, delicious cocktails and impeccable service were all up to their usual high Market Kitchen standard. As always every member of staff I encountered were the perfect hosts and excelled at customer service. Unfortunately Chef Lloyd was not very visual during our evening, so we didn’t get to meet him in person as expected and we didn’t experience the anticipated sit down sharing concept but instead sampled his food on platters in the upstairs bar area, so all in all an enjoyable and very tasty evening.

If you fancy spicing up your life in a magnificent New York style loft style setting, pop down to Market Kitchen where the Spice Market tasting menu will feature alongside the regular menu until the middle of March. The menu is available for a five-course dinner of ten tastes for AED 265++ from 7:00pm – 11:00pm. For more information click here