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Marking a major milestone in its journey through the kingdom’s palates, the Four Seasons Hotel Bahrain Bay’s beachside restaurant Byblos celebrated its first anniversary last week.
To commemorate the journey, the GDN Media team visited the Lebanese restaurant to sample some of its all-time favourites and get a taste of what’s to come.
At the helm of the restaurant is the property’s Oriental Specialty Chef Tony El Khoury, who gave us a tour of the live cooking stations, showing us a blend of traditional and modern Lebanese dishes.
When a restaurant positions itself as that of a specific country, one of the first questions it gets is around authenticity, and this has become a hotly debated topic within the food world. Some wonder whether something like saj with warm delicious Nutella qualify as authentic Lebanese cuisine.
But ultimately, in my opinion, trying to pigeonhole a cuisine to a fixed box of what may have been the ‘traditional’ meal at one time in history is the real affront to authenticity and the culinary arts. Tastes vary across borders, and often, when foods from abroad are adapted to local tastes, creativity finds its flavours evolving by leaps and bounds.
Take for example, the samboosa, which travelled from the Ottoman Empire to India and then came back to the Arab world with the Indian diaspora, reshaped, evolved, spicier, and much more delicious, in my biased opinion, of course. Or the shawarma, which has umpteen variants across the Arab world (and now, the six inhabited continents as well!)
And like the fillings within your favourite samboosa and shawarma, enveloped in the first year of Byblos’ operation was this evolution of its menu, as it found new flavours, learning from its diners and teaching them a bit (and a bite) about Lebanon’s culinary journeys, with many ingredients sourced from the country itself. And the special moments it fostered for its diners were the real friends made along the way.
“This first year has just flown by!” Chef Tony told us. “We have hosted many private dinners, corporate events and more, and it has been incredible.
“Our Saj night every Wednesday has been an amazing success, and we are kicking off our Lebanese barbecue nights, featuring entertainment and lots of live cooking stations.
“Of course, our menu has evolved along the way, and we are always finding new ways to surprise our guests with something truly special on their plate every night.”
At the media dinner marking Byblos’ first year, we had a number of sublime surprises, marrying the familiar with the unfamiliar.
And right off the bat, the colde mezzes that floated over to our tables gave us unique twists on dishes that have become ubiquitous across the island. From pesto hummus to a fantastic beetroot mutabal, mafroukit tajen (diced and spiced chunky vegetables turned into a hearty dip), pumpkin mutabal, muhammara (a spicy dip made of walnuts, red bell peppers, pomegranate molasses, and breadcrumbs), warak enab (vine leaves) and tabbouleh salad, each appetiser was unique, yet also comfortingly familiar.
Not ones to be left far behind, the hot mezze including kibbeh balls, fatayer spinach and batata harra also made it to our tables soon (and our stomachs a few seconds later).
The real stars of the show were to be found at the live cooking stations, donned by members of the Four Seasons and Byblos team, serving up saj options ranging from Zaatar with vegetables, Akawi and mozzarella cheese as well as Nutella and halwa in addition to the Levantine retort to the pizza – Manakish, with flavour options ranging from sujuk and cheese to chicken shawarma and halloumi pesto.
As we got a live show of traditional intermingling with modern, we turned to the most popular item on Byblos’ menu – its grills, including lamb chops, meat tikka, shish tawouk, lamb kebab and seabass harra.
With the succulent meat, delectable mezze and sumptuous Manakish marinating in our stomachs, we were just about ready to call it a night, but of course, that’s when our second stomachs growled for an offering of dessert.
And just in time, the dessert menu made its appearance, the highlights of which included possibly the best Um Ali I have ever tasted, flavoured with floral undertones, courtesy of a subtle rose infusion.
Not to be left behind, the Kunafa came in strong, with its perfectly crispy vermicelli complementing the soft melting cheese, bringing its absolute A game to the texture league.
On a final sweet note, Chef Imad Boukli put a modern culinary twist on the evening with a selection of handcrafted chocolate creations, for us to take home, which included Pistachio Kunafa (which, in my humble opinion, far superceded its Dubai viral counterpart), EarlGrey and Caramel Cardamom.
As the Byblos team waved us goodbye and we walked by the beach, we couldn’t help but marvel at how popular this restaurant has quickly become, while our stomachs already started dreaming of what kinds of dishes Chef Tony would be conjuring up for the upcoming Ramadan season.
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