The ingredient-forward experiential restaurant in the heart of SoBo has launched its new seasonal tasting menu. Here’s what we thought of it…
Tonight, diners at The Elephant Room Singapore will witness firsthand the culinary creativity of Chef Niyati Rao at Ekaa Mumbai, co-owned by her and restaurateur Sagar Neve. The one-night-only dinner to celebrate the Teck Lim Road restaurant’s third anniversary, will feature a tapas and cocktail menu that blends the best of ingredients from India and Singapore, put together by the young and imaginative team of Ekaa.
Ekaa, meaning unique, has been a standout establishment on Mumbai’s food scene ever since it opened in December 2021. In its first iteration, their 10-course degustation menu wowed us with its ingredient-forward, cuisine-agnostic approach and the drama it offered in the form of never-thought-of-before combinations and presentations.
So, when we heard that Chef Niyati was unveiling her Ekaa 2.0 tasting menu, we booked a table with great anticipation. The heritage building it’s housed in brought back many college memories for me, while the well-maintained gasp-worthy architecture (that sky-lit atrium is a daytime delight!) certainly put us in the mood for some well-constructed fine dining.
Inside, the high ceiling and calming décor complemented our high expectations and the calm that comes from knowing you’re in good hands. The team started us off with the cocktail named Petrichor, perfect, since we had just come in off the drenched streets of Fort. Monsoon is a mood, and the drink was given a first-rain feel, with the Mezcal infused with Parmesan cheese and the essence of calcium stone imparting that heady aroma of wet earth in this multi-note, earthy-yet-abstract concoction.
Their cocktails are inspired, as they put it, ‘by seven ecosystems, concocted with layers, flavours, and dimensions’. Like the food at Ekaa, they too are ‘ingredient forward’, which means that each of their components are thoughtfully procured; selected for their quality, provenance, and specific flavour profile; and combined in a way that each gets its due time in the limelight on your tongue, while also supporting the others to shine. And they have an evocative way of striking an emotional chord when you least expect it.
Which is what several of the courses in this new summer/monsoon menu do too. The ingredients may be exotic to blasé city palates — think Myrobalan or cherry plum, Kerala mangosteen, Himalayan rainbow trout, fermented bamboo shoots, or axone (the fermented soybeans from Nagaland that even had a 2019 film named after them!). But the execution of the final preparations evokes the familiar and the emotional. Certainly not what you can say of most restaurants.
It’s a slow burn though, starting with a rather timid Arambh, or ‘beginning’, a mild and refreshing assemblage of pandan jelly and cucumber granita. It doesn’t prepare me for what comes next, a course called Chimbori aani Chaha, which translates from Marathi to ‘crab and tea’. Chef Niyati appears tableside to serve me this one, explaining how it’s her take on the biscuits dipped in hot tea that we especially enjoy when it’s raining outside. There’s a pretty rose cookie resembling a South Indian achappam that’s made out of crab.
“Below that is a spicy pepper crab mixture, our own spice mix, inspired by kismoor (a Maharashtrian-Goan condiment that is made from sukat or dried shrimp). This has an intense shellfish flavour. You will either love it or… it can go either way,” she laughs. I later realise this is true of many of the courses.
What’s particularly interesting in this one is the nori powder sprinkled on top, which she says is made from local seaweed procured from Vishakhapatnam, and dots of tamarind chutney to intensify the experience along with shrimp head oil. “We don’t like to discard the shrimp heads or crab shells. We steep them in the oil and sous vide for a while so all the flavours of the shells get extracted into the oil,” she explains, as she pours the steaming hot crab broth infused with coriander and other herbs.
I didn’t expect to like this dish, one that brings the ocean into your mouth like a raging typhoon. But I not only loved it, but often yearn for that heart-warming crustacean flavour and the umami crunch of that delicious crab cookie, especially when the weather cools and it’s pouring outside. Chef Niyati actually ‘created’ this new rainy day craving in my brain!
While all this epiphanic exploration of my tastebuds and boundaries was on, what was my vegetarian dining companion doing? Well, he would typically have been served a second course titled Bhutta, probably a crazily creative version of something that is also a monsoon magic staple in India.
But, since they knew ahead of time that he is allergic to corn, the team at Ekaa decided to go the extra mile. They skipped serving this course to him. Perhaps an empty plate is better than an allergic reaction. And maybe it was difficult for them to come up with a replacement dish with a rich story at a day’s notice.
In fact, context is everything here. The team at Ekaa is young and enthusiastic. Each course was presented to us by different members in turn, each narrating a tale that was clearly designed to feed our soul as much as the food satisfied our appetite. As the meal progressed, the courses got more complex and creative, while we started to feel the world was getting ‘curiouser and curiouser’, much like Alice, and her adventures in Wonderland.
Visually delightful ones like ‘Lily Pond’ and ‘Fru-Tea’ seemed straight out of a fantasy tale. And the stories that accompanied each, got more and more elaborate too. The whiskey-based drink that I was sipping on, aptly named Obscure, had a smokey-sweet complex taste, that allowed me to float pleasantly on the narratives that were now flowing fast and furious.
I don’t really want to give away the surprises, because that is where the charm of this dining experience lies. But I will say that for those who have tried the OG menu, and raved about the ‘Tomato, tomato’ reminiscent of Rubik’s cube, and which was Chef Niyati’s ode to the tomato soup and breadsticks served on the Rajdhani Express, you will be similarly enchanted by the seventh course, which we had to visit the kitchen to ‘buy’.
By the time we left, we felt as though we had travelled across India, eating our way through regional fare, and interesting ingredients. There was a sense of wonder at the inspirations, the plating and presentation, and appreciation for the passion of the people — chefs, mixologists, waitstaff — who had put together the elegant evening. It didn’t feel like just a fancy dinner in a nice restaurant. It was more like a beautifully orchestrated performance, which had food and drink at the core, but it was the whole shebang that gave us the oohs.
According to me, the continuing draw of Ekaa — be it the earlier menu or this one — is its ability to evoke a sense of the familiar and the nostalgic even as it presents course after course of surprises. It’s a culinary rollercoaster that, at some points, zooms you to the height of clever cutting-edge concepts and, at others, dips into the comforting joys of a happy childhood. At the end of the day, just like Anton Ego, the food critic from the film Ratatouille did, that is where every diner wants to be transported.
Address: Ekaa Mumbai, D Kitab Mahal, 1st Floor, Sukhadwala Road, Azad Maidan, Fort, Mumbai 400001. Pricing: The vegetarian 10-course menu is priced at Rs 3799, the non-veg at Rs 3999, not inclusive of 10 per cent service charge and government taxes. Timings: Monday to Thursday, open from 12.30 pm to 3.30pm and seven pm to midnight. Friday, only seven pm to midnight. Closed on Mondays.
Overall rating: ⭐⭐⭐ (Max: 5 stars) | Food: 6.5/10 | Drinks: 7/10 | Service: 8/10 | Interiors: 7.5/10 | Vibe: 6/10 | One dish we loved: The Chimbori aani Chaha was sensational | One dish that didn’t work for us: As pretty as the Fru-Tea looked at first sight, it didn’t really impress in taste and texture.
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India Modern: Ingredients trump all on the menu at Ekaa, helmed by Chef Niyati Rao