The Burj Khalifa & Assado

So it was Johan's Birthday. 




Present:
Some back story - every year I try to buy Johan nice presents, expensive things he can keep. The problem is he keeps loosing them so far he's gone trough a Mont Blanc pen, two wallets, 2 pair of leather gloves a pair of trainers and a watch. So this year I opted for a change of tactic's. Instead of heading to the mall, I took a pic of Johan's beloved road bike, popped myself in a taxi and headed to Wolfi's Cycle shop on Shiek Zayed road. 

This collection of item is apparently
a better present than a Mont Blanc pen!

As soon as I walked through the door of Wolfi's it was obvious I didn't belong in the this alien world. Luckily the staff were brilliant - I pointed to the bike picture on my phone and said 

"I need to buy things for this bike, things that would make good present". 

20mins later I walked away with a big bag of bike swag that included something called a tri bar, a state of the art water bottle and various other biking paraphernalia. 


On the day it was declared the best present ever....and hooray for me the best wife ever!  

To mark the celebrations I also tried to bake a big lemon drizzle cake for Johan to take into work. Unfortuantely, it was less lemon drizzle cake and more big flat giant pancake with a waft at lemon. 


Now, my mother taught me how to bake as a child and I'm generally a good cook, but I seem to  have forgotten how to bake!

The only way is up!

In the evening I surprised Johan with drinks at AT.MOSPHERE which is a lounge bar & restaurant on the 123rd floor of the Burj Khalifa - the worlds tallest man made structure. It's imposing presence dominates Dubai's skyline, but we hadn't been up the Burj Khalifa yet since we've been here. So this seemed like a good way to celebrate Johan's Birthday by having a drink atop of the world's tallest building.  


The lift only has one button that goes up to the 123 floor. Until you are in the lift you can't comprehend how high up 123 floors actually is - it's nearly a kilometre in the sky!

A different view of the
Burj Khalifa from Assado

It's insane, I'm not usually afraid of heights but I did start to get a little vertigo if I stood to  close to the windows.

I'd booked a sunset table but unfortunately, there was no sunset it wasn't a very clear day so we had limited views. 

That's said, it was still pretty amazing in particularly watching the Dubai Mall fountain display from above.

Aerial view of 
Dubai fountains 

Johan has a few loves in life aside from me of course and his bicycle - they are, steak, cake and Malbec. I'm not sure where I rank in that list!

So every year on Johan's Birthday we have a tradition of going for 'steak and cake'. 

Usually I try to find little back street authentic Argentinian restaurants. However that whole 'authentic' scene doesn't really exist in Dubai, maybe for Indian and Asian cuisines but certainly not for South American. I'd looked at Gaucho as I know the ones in London, which are very glam, modern and bling but figured he'd prefer something more rustic. The best find ever was for Johan's 30th Birthday three years ago I discovered a little place London called Santa Maria Del Sur . This was before Gordon Ramsay found it and made it famous on a T.V. show and now you can't get a table apparently.

 

The phenomenal Steak Cake of 3 years ago

The food at Santa Maria Del Sur  was fantastic, the staff were lovely and fun, we had a big party there pretty much taking over the whole restaurant and the piece de resistance, me and the girls created the now legendary Steak Cake. Have no fear this wasn't a cake made of steak, it was a triple chocolate sponge with red butter cream centre made to look like a giant steak. Please note the attention to detail, accompanied by hand made fondant carrots and peas! 






Anyway back to the present, Assado is in The Palace hotel, in Dubai Mall and is tipped at being the best Argentinian restaurant in Dubai with the most extensive selection of Argentinian wines in the Middle East.

There's the Malbec!

We were seated in a great table outside by the water facing the Burj Kalifa with views of the spectacular Dubai fountain. I had been very specific about getting a good table when I called them but neglected to tell them why, more on that later. 




The menu offers a decent enough, if not really surprising selection Argentinian fare. Johan started with the roast baby goat which is their speciality and was excellent. I opted for the scallops in a bid it balance out all the red meat we would be consuming for our mains. 

Disappointing Scallops

The scallops sounded good on the menu, accompanied by a cucumber dressing - light, fresh, zingy, I thought. 
However, I was disappointed, the actual scallops themselves were quite bland and flavourless and the cucumber was over baring, as it came with a cucumber salad covered in cucumber foam.


There's this whole trend at the moment that I'm not a fan of, where everything comes covered in foam. To be honest I'm quite a classicist and think the only thing that should come with foam is a cappacino or beer. 




The service was generally good, but the sommelier had an annoying voice and I think at times was just talking crap. Lots of wild gesticulating and bold declarations but not really much substance. Johan threw her a few times with some questions and he's by no means a wine expert - he knows a thing or two about Argentinian wine because he studied there. 

There's the steak!

They also had a live Argentinian band playing which was excellent as we love live music and it helped create a cosy atmosphere.


When making the reservation what I didn't tell them was that it was Johan's birthday. 


Usually when you book a table at restaurants in Dubai they will ask you if it's a special occasion or birthday, but they didn't in this case so I forgot to mention it.

There's the cake!

However, it was every other person in the restaurants Birthday that night as well. 


Even the tables with couples who didn't speak to one another or when they did looked like they were discussing divorce terms, were celebrating one of their Birthdays. 



So throughout the evening the waiters came out clapping, with a cake and sparklers followed by the band singing 'Happy Birthday' in Spanish each time Johan thought it was for him. 


After, about the seventh time I had to confess to him that he wouldn't be getting the singing or a cake, as I'd forgotten to tell the restaurant. Plus, I couldn't go and ask them now as with all the Birthdays going on as they'd think I was just trying to get free cake. 

Ops sorry! 
Me confessing - as the band sings
happy birthday to  the table behind

I felt awful, Johan said he was quite relieved as he hates ' all that fuss'. I pointed out that if he didn't make'all that fuss' for my Birthday next week I wouldn't be quite so understanding.  


Full of Steak, Cake and Malbec we headed home and both fell asleep in the taxi on the way home - yup we.are.that.wild!