The JA Bateaux Dubai dinner cruise was definitely an experience to remember and one of the highlights of the trip. The boat is moored in a trendy little area along the ‘creek’ (it’s more of a river to me), and from my research, this is the only dinner cruise in Dubai with a full kitchen onboard the boat, so your meal is made to order by an executive chef (who we got to meet at the end of the evening). Most of the other boats are catered because they don’t have full service kitchens on board. You get to see all the buildings along the creek lit up at night, but most interesting are all the other boats on the creek with their multi-coloured lights. This dinner cruise is also one of the longer ones, likely because they have to cook much of the food as they go. I can’t remember now, but I think it was about 2.5 hours long…
I picked the package with all you can drink soft drinks (including juice and mocktails) but for around $30 CAD more per person you could get unlimited house wine (a really good deal!). The price for the two of us was $211 CAD. Given that this was a whole evening of entertainment and excellent food, I definitely think it was a great price! Service was excellent – the hosts/servers/management paid attention to detail, were friendly, ensured our water and drinks were always filled, and generally provided us with a great experience. A photographer walked the boat and took photos of the people at their tables – it turned out that the photos she took of us were actually really good… but after having spent $80 CAD on photos at the Burj Khalifa I didn’t want to spend another chunk of money here. The waitress took an okay photo of us for free LOL.
A musician played piano, guitar and sang classic and modern songs throughout the evening. We honestly didn’t think he was that great of a singer (he was Spanish so the enunciation of some words was off and he’s the kind of guy who changes the melody of songs that should just be left alone), but he was a great musician. It was a nice addition to the evening and we did enjoy it. I’ll apologize in advance for the photos – they are very shadowy because whenever they served us food they’d turn on a certain bank of lights (so we could see the food?) which was fine, except it didn’t provide a great situation for taking photos.
To start, we were given a plate of various appetizers – there was chicken on thin toast, smoked salmon on cucumber, and beets. I couldn’t tell you the details of each – and they were just okay.
We were then served a large basket of bread and butter (I really had to hold myself back so that I didn’t fill up on empty carbs!).
Next we were served a creamy vegetable soup. I thought it was delectable! So rich and creamy I could have drank much more of it (although I’m sure it was full of heavy cream and my waistline would not have been happy!).
The menu was pretty amazing – it was definitely to the level of a high end restaurant in Calgary and like I said, for the price (especially in Dubai) it was worth every single penny. With everything from prawns, beef carpaccio, foie gras, risotto, duck, lamb, cod & various vegetarian selections there was something in each course for everybody. And even though this was a ‘three course’ dinner, look at all the food we were served before the three courses even began!
To start, M chose the avocado and prawn with curried crème fraiche, ikura, minted avocado, beetroot carpaccio & wasabi mayo. The prawns were cooked perfectly and he quite liked it all.
I chose the baby beef carpaccio. 2 things – 1) when I ordered it the server said something like ‘you know that is raw beef?’ and I almost laughed at him; 2) I have not eaten much red meat in over a year now… but this seemed to me like a delectable treat, and I was on holidays! The beef carpaccio was served with (cold) saffron arancini, truffled enoki mushrooms and potato galette with parmesan cheese and rocket salad. Damn, it was worth breaking my red meat ban. That carpaccio melted in my mouth.
For the main, M chose the beef tenderloin with celeriac fondant, braised pearl onions, mushroom tortellini, coriander mash, shimiji mushroom and miso-thyme jus. M’s used to well-cooked meat (they often boil their beef in Nigeria or grill it over charcoal in thin slices) so he ordered the tenderloin well done. I tasted a piece and even cooked to well, it was still delicious.
I ordered the roasted barbarie duck with red cabbage, confit sweet potato, duck dumpling, pumpkin puree, mandarin & blackberry shiraz jus. It was a really hard decision to make because everything looked so good, but I was very happy with my choice. I’ve had this combination before – the duck and red cabbage (it was underneath the duck), and it’s always a winner!
M was excited to try some new fruits and it was a relatively safe choice for someone who doesn’t have a lot of exposure to fancy sweet and rich desserts. The fresh fruit plate included pineapple, honeydew melon, rock melon, dragon fruit, kiwi, blueberry, blackberry, raspberry, a macaroon shell, marshmallow, and lemon sorbet. It was neat to see M experience new flavours and new textures.
I didn’t go with my usual chocolate choice for dessert – I chose the passion fruit bavarois with Italian meringue, rhubarb confit, a passion macaron, fennel sand, and mango sorbet. It was zippy and light.
Everything was delicious and if you are planning a trip to Dubai I highly recommend you do this dinner cruise. For sure!
Every time I see a menu with foie gras I feel bad about how the geese are apparently force-fed and how it seems like such a selfish thing for humans to do. However, I read this on the menu and have to give them credit for recognizing that fancy food isn’t always nice… I was pretty happy.
[…] Overall, I think it’s possible to stay within a decent price range for dinner out as long as you are prepared not to eat at hotel restaurants. Around the Marina and near any of the resort areas and high-end shopping malls, there are a lot of expensive restaurants. Wander around and take a look at the menus before taking a seat. In my opinion, the best foodie experience of the trip was definitely the dinner cruise. […]