Iftar review: Ewaan at The Palace Downtown Dubai

Full disclosure first: I’ve always been a big fan of the iftar at Ewaan, the all-day dining restaurant at The Palace Downtown Dubai. It’s grand, it’s extensive, the food never disappoints and I’ve always found the experience worth every fil I spend. So I wasn’t going to give it a miss this year. Thankfully, they haven’t changed things up a lot.

Because the spread is so extensive, there’s no way you can taste every single item laid out and live to tell the tale. So you need to pick your battles. In my case, it was all about trying things I don’t always find on a menu.

The camel kofta caught my eye. I’ve never had camel before and I thought having it in kofta form — that’s basically minced, mixed with spices and fried — was a good introduction. It was full of flavour, beef-y in taste and consistency. I went for seconds.

The grill section, with prawns, calamari, salmon and lobster, was a big hit. The guys manning that counter would have worked the hardest that night as they tried to keep up with the demand. The carving section had beef, chicken, lamb, turkey and, my favourite, duck.

Ewaan mixes cuisines up. So the mains section had a lot of Indian curries and Arabic classics. My top pick from there was the salmon in lemon and garlic sauce, which was just the right side of tangy, to soften the fishy taste, and tasted amazing with the basmati rice. And the sheikh al mehshi, the eggplant stuffed with lamb.

Two massive carving stations, for the lamb ouzi and for hammour sayadia, both Arabic favourites, have a pride of place in this iftar. I wish people will stop eating the hammour, though. But hey, this review is not for discussing insignificant things like overfished species.

I wish the juices would be a little less diluted and the lighting a little brighter, so I could appreciate the almost-faultless food. But all in all Ewaan, as usual, didn’t disappoint.

The details:

Where: Ewaan, The Palace Downtown Dubai

Price: Dh230

Timings: Sunset until 9pm

Call: 04-4287806