Back to Mozaic Ubud, well what can I say, this is Bali's temple of haute cuisine. The restaurant offers a few prix-fixe menu options including an ultimate surprise menu.
We arrived slightly earlier than expected and the hostess showed us the way into a waiting room where we were shown the menu. A small welcoming dish soon followed - cheese puff with liquid truffle (5/10).
After a 15-minute wait, it looked like the dining room was ready. The staff escorted different groups into the forest-like passage one by one, before finally reaching a quiet dining area surrounded by lush trees.
The dining area is modernly designed with red and wood. There's nice separation between each table to ensure that enough privacy is provided.
And if you want to enjoy your dinner even more, trying bringing your own mosquito repellent. You would be thankful that you did!
After weighing our options, we decided that the Surprise Menu was the right one for us. What we like about this surprise menu is that no one will have the same dish on the same table. Now that's what I call surprise!
Our dinner was off to a decent start with an amuse bouche of small foie gras mousse with green apple and lemongrass foam.
A further amuse bouche of tuna cone with parmesan cheese, black and white sesame was next (4.5/10).
We couldn't wait to start things rolling with all their surprises. First up was a baby lobster served with different textures of tangerines. Each piece of lobster had a bit of caviar on top and was sprinkled all over with crushed nuts.
Putting lobster with tangerine was an interesting idea and that South East Asian twist worked quite well for this dish (6.5/10).
Carpaccio of mother of pearl was presented with carrots, peanuts, spring onion and caviar. The taste of the carpaccio was actually alright but it could certainly use a facelift (4/10).
Keeping up with the sea theme, here's a poached Boston lobster with charcoal grilled watermelon, radish and black truffle. The lobster was deliberately poached to just half- cooked with watermelon cubes and puree providing the finishing touches.
But that fresh taste of Boston lobster seemed to be missing (4/10).
One last dish before we finished with our seafood dishes and it was a pan-seared seabass with hazelnut puree, hazelnuts and Spanish Iberico ham. That was nicely complemented by a light parmesan emulsion (5.5/10).
The foie gras trio was probably the most confident dish of this kitchen as we have seen it in almost all of their prix-fixe menus. We were served with two slightly different versions here.
The first interpretation consisted of a foie gras terrine with strawberry sorbet, a charcoal grilled foie gras with raspberry puree and finally a pan seared foie gras with beetroot and hazelnut (4.5/10).
But I liked the second interpretation a little better. This one had a foie gras terrine with tangerine puree and jelly, a charcoal grilled foie gras with orange juice and sun dried orange and then a pan seared foie gras with arugula and hazelnut (5/10).
Up to this point, we have been less than impressed with most of these dishes. Are we being too harsh on the most celebrated restaurant in all of Indonesia? Let's see if things will turn around for us with our meat courses.
Our first meat course was a roasted Iberico pork with cherry puree and cocoa beans (4/10).
Slightly better was the vension fillet served with artichoke, barley, mushroom and truffle sauce (4.5/10).
A long 3-hour dinner was finally drawing to a close. Having our driver waited for more than an hour, we just wanted to wrap things up as quickly as possible.
So let's head to our dessert section, shall we!?
Mango sorbet with chocolate crumble and nuts showed up as the first dessert of the night (3.5/10).
And the dessert parade continued with a freshly baked brioche with cheese, truffle and Iberico ham. Yes, brioche and cheese for dessert you got that right (4.5/10) !
A less-than-stellar chocolate fondant with basil ice-cream, beetroot juice and olive powder failed to make the highlight for us. Looked like the chocolate fondant was slightly overcooked. Not much chocolate lava oozing out (3.5/10).
We were slightly happier with the other dessert, a ginger flower sorbet with guava chocolate roll (5/10).
A very quick petite fours before we woke our driver up in his car.
We were not sure if the departure of Chef Chris Salans has anything to do with this but it was an overall sub-par effort.
Food Rating: 5.3/10
Price: $$$$
Address: Jl. Raya Sanggingan, Ubud, Gianyar, Bali 80571, IndonesiaWebsite: www.mozaic-bali.com
S. Pellegrino Asia's 50 Best Restaurants: 50th (2013)
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