ADRIAN QUETGLAS - DINNER

Address:       Paseo Mallorca, 20, 07012, Palma de Mallorca
Telephone:    00 34 971 781 119

I went here with my husband, stepson and his daughter on a Saturday evening in September.  It was to have a belated celebration of my stepson's birthday.

I had booked the table a few weeks ahead as the restaurant gets very busy.  The restaurant rang me 2 days beforehand to check the booking and also to check if the diners had any food allergies or other dietary requirements.  As we had one person who had recently had teeth implants (and could not eat meat, only soft food) and another who was pregnant (who had to avoid uncooked seafood and certain cheeses), they adapted the menu for them.

There is only 1 menu which is a 7 course tasting menu (€50 per head), but the course that contained uncooked seafood was adapted for our pregnant diner and the meat course was replaced with fish for the diner who could not eat meat.

We were given a warm and friendly, but professional, welcome to the restaurant.

A menu was brought to our table quickly and drinks ordered and delivered shortly afterwards.  I was going to order a Hendricks G&T but the owner of the restaurant suggested I might like to try another gin, Opihr, which has eastern spices in it.  However, there was no pressure to try it if I didn't want to.  I decided to give it a go and it was well made and had interesting botanicals which I thoroughly enjoyed.  The pregnant diner stuck to water and the other 2 diners went with the drinks "pairing" menu which matched the wine with each course and consisted of 5 different wines at a price of €25.  However, it was no problem to have an extra glass of any of the wines that were particularly enjoyed or replace a wine (for example, my husband doesn't not drink cava that was the first wine on the pairing menu) that was not wanted with an alternative.

Each course was exquisitely presented and tasted divine.  The first was a seafood creation with tiger's milk ice cream, the second an egg yolk which had been dusted with gold and floated in a tasty savoury cream, the third was a rice, asparagus and foie gras, the fourth was corvina and the fifth was beef.

They were all delicious and it would be difficult to pick out a favourite.  By this stage of the meal we were beginning to fill up, so the waiter asked if we would like a 5 or 10 minute break before finishing with our 2 dessert courses.  We went with this suggestion to let the previous courses settle.

To finish we had the first dessert of black cherries with sponge cake and balsamic ice cream.  This was not too sweet but tasty.  However, none of us were taken with the sponge cake which looked more like pieces of brown bread and did not have the texture that I would recognise as sponge cake.

The second dessert was white chocolate mousse with beetroot and grapefruit which, again, was not too sweet but tasty.  On top there were crispy leaves but they were a bit like the sponge cake and did not really work for us even though they looked pretty.

By the end of the meal, we were all pleasantly full and thoroughly enjoyed our dining experience in spite of the sponge cake and crispy leaves on the desserts.

Throughout the meal we were served by charming waiting staff who took time to explain each course and were completely unfazed when we strayed from the food or drinks menus.

The bill, including tips, came to €350 for the 4 of us.  As this is a Michelin Star restaurant and we ate and drank exactly what we wanted, we felt this was a very fair price for a superb feast.

It would not be somewhere that I would go every week but I would definitely go back again.  We were told that the menu changes monthly so most people would probably not go here more than once a month unless they particularly wanted to replicate their food on 2 occasions within a month.

For a special celebration it would definitely be on my list of places to go.

LA ROSA - SUPPER

Address:        Calle Rosa, 5, 07003, Palma de Mallorca
Telephone:    00 34 971 778 929

I went here with my husband and another couple on a Friday evening in September.

The restaurant has a retro feel to it and the tables are close together so the ambience is lively and noisy.  If it is a quiet romantic meal that you are after then this is not the place.  But if you want to feel the buzz of the city in the company of  locals and tourists then this is the place to be.

The staff gave us a friendly welcome and their warmth and professionalism was evident during our whole eating experience.

As it is always hard to get a table - it is not possible to book one -we arrived there early (for Palma) at 7 pm and, "bingo!!", our luck was in.

Our friends arrived about 10 minutes after us and we were able to have a drink at the bar until they arrived, but the restaurant advised us to go to our table before they arrived to make sure of keeping it.

Menus were brought quickly, and our drinks order taken and delivered in a timely fashion.  Between us we had G&T's, rum and coke, white and red wine by the glass.  The wines are acceptable to drink but not top quality, but the spirits with mixers were just right.

We decided to order dishes that appealed to all of us and put them in the middle of the table to share.  The waiter did not encourage us to over order which you can be tempted to do when there is such a great selection.  Our choices were pimientos de padron (small green peppers fried with rock salt), Octopus with potato, garlic and olive oil, a variety of mushrooms sautéed in olive oil, patatas bravas (sautéed potatoes with a spicy sauce), chips, cod croquettes and fried baby squid.  Each dish was comprised of good quality fresh ingredients, cooked well and a good amount for sharing.  My favourite dish was the octopus.

The dishes were brought over the period of at least half and hour which meant that you could enjoy each one as it arrived rather than be faced with the whole lot at once.

We were sufficiently satisfied that desserts were not required but two of us had cortados (small coffees with a shot of hot milk) which were well made.

With a tip, the bill came to €150 for the four of us which we felt was very good value for the food and drink that we had consumed.

We shall continue to be regulars here whenever we can get a table!