Domvs by Gabriel Fratini @ Sheraton Towers, Scotts Road
“What do we eat for dinner?” Such questions haunt me almost every day.
I know most who are like me who are always indecisive when it comes to picking out what to eat. And when you head into a restaurant, you’re faced with another headache of what to have from the menu. This is especially when the restaurant has an extensive menu and you just want to eat everything off it.
Hence, the Omakase style dining has been introduced by the Japanese. This way, you just walk in and tell the staff what you don’t like to eat and you’d be served a surprise course. In a way, this challenges the chef’s creativity as he or she would have to create dishes with only whatever available (kind of like Masterchef).
Although this dining style was introduced by the Japanese, Chef Gabriel Fratini has adopted this into his Italian cuisine.
When we took our seats over at Domvs, Chef Gabriel came over and just asked us if there were any dietary restrictions and which kind of meat we would prefer. After that, he left us to cook up a storm in his kitchen.
We have totally no idea what we would be served next, all we knew that we were supposed to sit back, relax and be served seven different courses.
For those of you who are already making your plans to come here, do remember that you would probably not be served the same dishes as we were served this time round. But this give you an idea of Chef Gabriel’s creativity in coming up with the dishes.
The first dish to arrive was the Prawn with Orange Sauce. In my opinion, the prawn was very strong in flavour and the orange sauce did not stand out very much. But then again, I love prawns and this was a nice start to our meal.
Next we were served Beef Shin with Sweet Potatoes, Beans and Baby Corn, which I thought was just delightful. The beef was so tender, I didn’t even need to cut it with a knife. I can tell that the ingredients used here are really premium as the baby corn was sweet.
The Risotto with Scallops and Burrata Cheese came after and was one of my favourites for the night. The scallops were just amazing and the cream based sauce for the pasta went so well with it.
A pretty interesting dish followed after, the Chicken with Foie Gras and Red Wine Sauce, which is also one of the chef’s specialty. I wasn’t a big fan of the foie gras that was served on top of the chicken meat, because I thought it was a little too mushy and heavy. But I did think the chicken was nicely done and went well with the red wine sauce.
The Salmon Ravioli with Butter Sauce and Shaved Black Truffles was up next and hands-down was my favourite dish for the night. The salmon ravioli was nicely al dente and did not carry a strong fishy taste. I liked how instead of using a fancy sauce base, simple butter was used so that the flavours would not overpower the ravioli. The shaved truffles didn’t bring as much flavour as I thought it would though.
Before the dishes came out, Chef Gabriel asked if we would prefer fish or lamb. And since there were two of us, we picked both to try.
The sixth course was the Barramundi with carrot and green pea sauce as well as the Lamb with Wild Mushroom. I personally preferred the lamb dish as the meat was marinated well and cooked to a tender perfection, but the mushrooms that came with it was far too salty for me.
The fish however didn’t fare as well in flavour but had a nice crisp to its skin, which I thought was nice.
And down to the last course, desserts! We were served a plate of three desserts: Semifreddo, Tiramisu and Chocolate Puff with Coconut Toppings.
Among the lot, the Tiramisu was my favourite. I did wish there were more of it! The Semifreddo was something different. It’s a semi frozen mousse-like dessert and it had a nice orange-y zing to it. The perfect palate cleanser after a heavy and flavourful meal.
The Chocolate Puff however was a little disappointing. It was kind of like a biscuit coated in chocolate instead of a puff pastry. The coconut topping was quite nice but too sweet for my liking.
The Italian-Omakase-style dining is an experience I think is worth trying at least once, especially for the price point.
The 4-course lunch is at $68++ while the 7-course dinner is priced from $128++.
DOMVS by Gabriel Fratini
Sheraton Towers Singapore
39 Scotts Rd, Singapore 228230
Tel: +65 6839 5622
Opening hours:
Daily 11.30am to 2.30pm; 6.30pm to 10.30pm