| Brava Bistro delivers an urban experience
Brava Bistro has been around for a few years now, but it always feels new when I go in, and I'm invariably impressed by the urbanity of the place. It's one of the only Calgary restaurants where diners routinely eat at the bar, a large horseshoe-shaped affair around which tables and booths are scattered. The fact that people are always eating at the bar injects a casualness into the spirit of the place – it makes the relationship between the diners and the staff more fluid, and, when the restaurant's full, it's like a cocktail party. In the summertime, this spills out onto the street. I've heard some people complain that this makes the restaurant too noisy. I, on the other hand, want to eat dinner in a place where people are clearly having a good time, and if it's noisy, so be it.
The menu at Brava (723 - 17 Ave. S.W., phone 228-1854) has had its ups and downs – the kitchen always seemed to be in search of the right type of food to fit the room, and this led to a few wrong turns. In the last month or so, though, Brava has returned to serving what made them popular in the first place: North American bistro food. On a recent busy Friday night, we had well-prepared, interesting food – it doesn’t absolutely knock your socks off, and it takes the occasional wrong step, but it's solid.
We started with some appetizers. The braised short ribs ($11) were great, and the meat fell off the bone. They were richly flavoured with Traditional Ale, and also had a slightly Asian flavour, as though soy or oyster sauce had been added. The seared sea scallops ($14) were also good, if very slightly overcooked (and that's easy to do), and were finished with a rich and flavourful port and butter sauce. The prawn and vegetable tempura ($10) was a creditable effort, although it didn't fit very well with the rest of the bistro menu.
The bistro caesar salad ($9) was excellent. The dressing had clearly been made just before it was served, and had lots of lemon to balance the roasted garlic, as well as freshly shaved parmesan. Caesar salad is really supposed to illustrate diversity of flavour, and show how all the ingredients work together – this was one of the best I've had in a restaurant. Thank God it wasn't one of those big goopy messes you see all the time.
The main dishes were similarly simple, hearty and good. The Mediterranean pizza ($13) had lots of asiago and fiery chorizo, and this Mediterranean theme was carried on through into Brava’s tuna niçoise ($27), which included seared ahi with baby potatoes and a springy watercress cream. It takes guts to serve niçoise at this time of year, as it generally depends on the best ingredients, but the potatoes were sweet, the ahi rare and the tomatoes tasty.
The beef tenderloin special ($25) was also rare and tender, and surprisingly full of flavour. The pork chop ($21), slightly overdone, had a nice red pepper and potato puree accompanying it. The frites ($4 extra) were served with a lovely aioli, but needed to be more crispy to be perfect – I have to say, though, that the quality of frites in Calgary has skyrocketed.
The cheese plate we had following dinner was a bit uninspired. The cheeses were excellent quality, but I expected more creamy cheese, more chevre and less hard cheese – and I think Oka is a bit too pungent for a cheese plate, as it can overpower the other selections. This is quibbling, though.
The wine list is reasonably priced and, compared to the retail value, gets progressively less expensive as you spend more money. For example, the 1998 Domaine du Thalabert Crozes Hermitage is $35 retail (at least), and it's on the wine list at Brava for $53 – a very modest markup.
Brava' s not cheap, but it's a fun splurge restaurant, especially if you want something more casual and less rarefied. I'll be back for sure. |
