Sunday brunch at Eros Hotel promises to be everything you want your comfort spread to be. It is elaborate with nine live stations and flowing champagne. By Navneet Mendiratta
With the sun playing hide and seek and city donning a gloomy look, the best bet to perk yourself up is to resort to comfort eating. Especially if the day you pick up happens to be a Sunday.
So it was not certainly by chance that I chose Eros Hotel, Nehru Place for their winter Sunday brunch offer. That there was champagne flowing was definitely a deciding factor. To be honest, Sunday is the new busy day in the hospitality industry with leading Delhi hotels and independent fine-dining spaces offering lavish spreads and leisurely set-ups to lure Delhiites to brunch out. I am equally happy to admit my weakness here.
Blooms, the 24 hour coffee shop of the hotel, was buzzing with activity as guests poured in to sample a variety of special delicacies, flowing cocktails, live band performance by the poolside and a leisurely meal under the weak winter sun. Set out in a buffet, the cuisine borrowed extensively from all over the world. Continental, Asian, Indian, Mediterranean, lebanese… you name it and you had it here.
I’d had a particularly early dinner the night before. So to gently ease the hunger growls, I opted for some nice leafy offerings before I looked at the other counters. For a change it was nice to see chefs putting their imagination to the otherwise very safe and traditional station. Roasted mushroom caps with balsamic and cheese flakes, apple celery and walnut salad, harissa prawn with cherry tomatoes and tea flavoured eggs with tapenade are some of the nicer ones that I got to taste. And mind you the ones listed here make for not even one third of the offerings there.
Happy with my greens, I decided to give the cold cuts and cheese stations a miss and head straight for the live counters. Every Sunday, the hotel puts up as many as nine live stations to allow their guests the pleasure of enjoying the food getting cooked before the eyes. From sushi and Sashimi to teppanyaki, Italian, sizzlers, dimsums, clay oven, seafood and even south Indian, I happily dug into my favourite selections from these counters over the next three hours.
While the live grills continue to attract the brunching lot the most, the restaurant offers a selection of mains from Asian, European and Indian sections.
I could not resist the lure of a well prepared lamb massman curry and white wine poached fillet of sole with carrot and snowpeas in the European section. Absolute delight.
Desserts are not an easy choice to make, too. The restaurant has a very special dessert island for an indelible brunch experience. The most sinful ones included peach mascarpone, crème brulee, coffee pannacotta, lemon cheesecake, banoffee pie and coffee eclairs.
To be honest, there is much more to the Sunday Brunch here. The live music by the poolside is perfect to make you linger even longer on a warmer day. Is it surprise then that most guests who walk in at noon rarely leave before four, which is half an hour past the finish time. I did. And I am sure you would too when you check this out.