Fyra: better late than never

Please note that since writing this blog post, Fyra has closed down

I’ve said this so many times I sound like a broken record: it does not take much to make me spend money in a restaurant. Offer me an aperitif, I’ll take it. Ask me if I want dessert, there’s a good chance I’ll say yes. I’ve got profit written all over my forehead. And I don’t even see it as up-selling. I genuinely want these things. What I don’t want is to have to make more effort to get them than the people who are paid to sell them to me.

I arrived at Fyra 15 minutes before my friends last night. The waitress took my coat, led me to my table, and disappeared. Not only did I look like Norma no-mates, but I didn’t even get a drink to keep me company. It may be overly British of me, but I don’t want to have to raise my voice and wave my arms in a relatively smart-looking establishment in order to attract sufficient attention to merit a glass of water.

Still, my dining companions arrived eventually and the whole menu/wine-list/drinks thing started happening. Better late than never. We ordered a bottle of Moldovan red, since I’d never had it before, which was good value – luckily, given that we got through three bottles of the stuff. We didn’t study the menu for two long, since the daily fixed menu had already seduced all four of us: three courses for €31 or four for not a lot more. It was a no-brainer.

But before the first of our four courses, we received a little amuse. Or two little amuses to be precise: a cheese bitterbal (which consequently tasted like a cross between a bitterbal and a kaastengel) and a delicately flavoured salmon tartare that appeared in a dish that was like a mini version of those silver domes that used to cover plates in hotels in the 80s – unnecessary, but cute.

Our starter was a single scallop (which I’d venture was ever so slightly overcooked), with some smoked eel, pickled miniscule mushrooms, micro-shoots (or whatever they’re called these days) and a rather gelatinous sauce that looked and tasted… pale. The whole thing needed to be at once hotter and less cooked, with more flavour in the sauce and less in the vegetables.

After this inauspicious start, I must admit things got significantly better. Bread (in the form of mini, salted brioches) was readily replenished and made an excellent sponge for the parmesan foam with which our monkish arrived. The fish sat atop a chunk of bitter roasted chicory and something salty and porky running through the sauce – like pancetta. The four elements together made an excellent combination. So good that I might steal the idea.

Our main was simply seasoned and barbecued American beef with a rich, luscious truffle and red wine sauce. The mashed potato and savoy cabbage they came with sound rather pedestrian in comparison, but they formed a sensibly understated backdrop for what was clearly very good beef.

Before dessert, we had a little glass of apple confit topped with whipped cinnamon cream that tasted very much like my espuma for Winter Hidden Kitchen (for those of you who were there!). Dessert itself focused on pineapple and coconut, which meant that most of the elements on my plate tasted like a Piña Colada. If you like Piña Colada, that’s no bad thing – though some more variation could’ve been no bad thing either.

Dinner came to just over €50 each, including wine and a tip, which felt like good value for what we ate – which is why I’m giving it four stars. But if I have to wait 15 minutes for a drink next time, it won’t be better late than never; it’ll be never again.