Wrong turn?

Someone at Trader's Hotel has a great sense of humour. And they put it to great use in naming the hotel's main eatery, The Junction.

Oh, look, the hotel is prominently situated on a major crossroads in the centre of Deira, itself a part of town where people from all parts of the world cross paths. It's just too perfect! Then one comes to the chicken-and-egg question: Which came first, the punny name or the "fusion" menu, where burgers overtake stir fries and give way to pizzas?

Whatever the case, it only narrowly avoided a nasty pile-up.

The meal began well enough, in the soothing surroundings of the gigantic dining room. One imagines that had it been full, the din might have been off-putting. As it was, there was a suitably quiet smattering of diners seated on the chocolate leather banquettes and the room was divided by all manner of urns and screens, which served to provide some seclusion.

Decisions, decisions

At first, the large menu seemed tempting, and provided an interesting option: The special dinner menu includes a main course, salad and dessert buffets and beverages. From the selection, diners can select main course-sized portions, or two starter sizes.

My problem with set menus has always been that I usually spy something on the a la carte pages that tempts me away. That was the case here, with a wide assortment of interesting starters and one that really caught my eye, the seafood carpaccio. In the end, we threw caution to the wind and ordered starters from the menu and took the dinner promotion too, for good measure.

Things were much simpler over the other side of the table, where my dinner partner had earlier spotted the oriental menu - with Pan-Asia dishes from Indonesia to China — and picked a meal.

Get started

Our starters — a duo of spring rolls from Vietnam and Malaysia, and the seafood carpaccio — arrived swiftly and artistically dressed, although I think perhaps that the luscious spicy sesame dipping sauce on my plate was meant for the spring rolls, not the smoked salmon.

The deep-fried Malaysian rolls were better-than-average, with a crisp texture and plenty of filling, and the dipping sauce, once it made its way around the table, suited them perfectly. The Vietnamese rolls, of which I am a huge fan, were excellent.

These are cold rolls of prawn or chicken, with finely shredded carrot and thin rice noodles, beansprouts and mint leaves, wrapped in a thin rice-dough skin. These cool, refreshing snacks really should be more readily available in the summers here.

The rolls would have benefited from a dip of fish sauce and vinegar, but they were moist enough to go down well without it.

The seafood carpaccio was a massive plateful of fishy delights, although none of them in the raw state advertised in the name carpaccio (ital).

They were, however, thinly sliced as expected — sliver upon sliver of succulent smoked salmon, sliced cooked prawn and scallop.

The scallop had been subjected to some nasty treatment in the kitchen, leaving it as cold, rubbery pieces - thin slices of raw (perfectly fresh) scallop would have been fine. The saffron aioli was a fragrant yellow topping for the prawns and salmon when piled on the Swedish-style crispbread that accompanied the dish.

Savoury

My partner's Chinese beef dish was well-executed, with plenty of green onion, pak choi and a savoury sauce. I thought I'd chosen two starters from the dinner promotion menu, but when the dishes arrived at the table, I thought I'd mistakenly picked from the dessert selection.

Pan fried smoked duck breast was cooked rare and smoky, with crisp skin, but the sauce and the red cabbage accompaniment was rather sweet and cloying.

And what I had really looked forward to, the pan-fried lobster with honey mustard, was a real disappointment. Two deep-fried, battered lumps with a bowl of yellow poster paint was not what I had expected.

The sauce was too sweet and at the same time too pungent, and the colour was just shocking. The batter on the lobster was thick and chewy, and obscured any temptation the meat underneath might have provided. Nothing on the plate looked like it should be eaten - except the potato wedges, which, with the bright yellow sauce, confirmed my other thought — that I had wandered into the children's menu.

To get away from that blinding sauce, I wandered over to the salad buffet, which to The Junction's credit, was fresh and tempting. But the dessert buffet lined up alongside was actually more tempting (perhaps my sweet tooth had been awakened by my main course). Chocolate torte was rich and creamy, the baklawa was gooey, and I was intrigued by an unusual jelly bonbon — a chunk of sugar-dusted jelly of varying colours.

The Junction's dinner idea - of a mix of cuisines, with salad, dessert and drinks for a manageable sum - is a good one, but suffers from over-ambition. Keep your choices simple — a steak or lamb chops, perhaps - and you'll have a relaxing, filling and decent meal.

Checklist

How to get there: Corner of Abu Baker Al Siddique and Salah Al Din streets, after the clocktower in Deira.

Décor: Brown chic
Dress Code: Smart casual
Must have: Seafood carpaccio; dessert buffet
Seats: 100
Open from: 6.30am until 2am
The verdict