Mona's Meals | Sunday, 25 January 2009

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Sheep in wolf’s clothing

Cue the I-told-you-so dance because another one of my predictions has come true. I have been saying for years that dashing off to several destinations - London, Paris, Dubai - is much better value for money than buying the same stuff from Malta. And that includes accommodation and flights.
This year, or rather last, London became the destination for a lot of Maltese. A €99 Air Malta ticket (don’t bother with the ‘low-cost’ airlines or you’ll pay through your teeth to check in your heavy luggage on the way back) and a couple of nights in a B&B (check Alistair Sawday’s wonderful website for inspiration) and your shopping is literally in the bag.
The choice is incredible, and at this point, most shops are running at 60 per cent discounts. That includes Selfridges, Harvey Nichols and Harrods. The Maltese are flocking to all of them, and of course, to all the cheaper stores on Oxford Street.
We might now realise, seeing that many of us are experiencing it first hand, that ‘service’ in the UK is of a much poorer quality than that in Malta. The indifference, coupled with rules and regulations about everything, is quite astounding. A couple of months ago, at Harvey Nicks, I was shocked to note that the salespeople, most of them teetering on the brink of unemployment, and spending the whole day staring into nothingness because there were no British customers, absolutely did not care about the few - foreign of course - customers that were around. I tried to buy a Chloé bag, not cheap by any standards, and was on the brink of grabbing one of them by the hair just to get her attention.
At Marks & Spencer’s on Oxford Street, the staff had nothing to do except chatter. Once you approach them to ask them something, they find hundreds of excuses not to serve you and not to budge from their position. When I read that the company had axed 1400 jobs, I was not surprised at all.
At Primark, crap service takes on a whole new meaning. Whereas some staff manage to drum up a low-voltage spark of enthusiasm in order to find your matching £10 skirt, most of them will not even bother looking at you, regardless of whether you’re buying a pair of pants or half the shop. Waiting in the 30-strong line for the cashier, staff were jumping the queue and quibbling with customers over who was first. In my book, that would be an immediate sackable offense. Obviously at Primark there is some kind of ‘right’ that entitles staff to treat customers like crap.
It is generally acknowledged, within fashionista/shopaholic circles that Paris is the city for good service. All the staff chirrup a nice “Bonjour!” as soon as you walk in, and as a non-savage customer, you are meant to return that “Bonjour!” with an equal amount of enthusiasm. This does not mean that they expect you to buy anything. It is just taken for granted that being polite to one another is the order of the day.
Rome has become the most boring shopping city of all: the proliferation of the same shops on each street (Intimissimi, Miss 60, Geox - how many identical bras, jeans and shoes can you possibly buy?) means that the choice is very limited. For some odd reason, the designer shop staff have remained aloof and high-handed here, which always makes me want to scream “You’re a Prada salesgirl you twit, with the salary to match, and not Miuccia Prada herself. Go on, give us a smile. And the size 10 jacket please.”
The one place where Italians have kept a smile is the food shop. I love that “Buongiorno signora!” that always accompanies forays into the butcher’s or at the baker. They know the meat and bread they are selling inside out, they know its provenance and are quick and efficient yet caring.
Yet, for some odd reason, Italians do not export very well. I am trying very hard to remember a single Italian (Sicilian or whatever) who came to work in Malta, who even set up his own business, and who brought his smile and his enthusiasm with him. What is it? Are we turning them into right ogres?
Take the Sicilian pasticceria in Sliema. I had heard about people lining up outside its doors on Sunday mornings, of its wondrous cassatella, of their tear-inducing pasti tal-lewz. So TW and I set off to battle with the parking. The sweet stuff was all there but it certainly did not extend to the elderly man behind the counter who treated us and everybody else in a supercilious manner, pretended not to understand our Italian (how difficult is “Sei di questi” to understand?), who has obviously not bothered to learn a word of English or Maltese. His attitude is a fine combination of passive aggression and snobbishness. Sadly, this is just one guy, but you have a good chance of coming across him, and that colours your experience every time.
Thankfully, at Tana del Lupo, bad service is an exception, rather than a rule. The female servers were both fantastic, smiling along, happy to be working. The sommelier (who is also the guy who takes the order) was extremely well-versed, knew his wine, his meat and his menu and was happy to let us know about it. Yet one young Italian guy spent the entire night avoiding our orders and generally giving us the impression that he’d rather be elsewhere. Italy, probably.
Maybe it is human interaction which gets to these people. Certainly, the guys in the kitchen are doing a fantastic job. We had been overwhelmed by the very long menu and decided to go for the ‘assaggi’. They were perfect in practically every way except for the mussels, some of which tasted very obviously ‘off’.
The fish-cake, made with neonati, was absolutely sublime. No, or extremely little, wheat, had made it to the mix. Instead of aiming for a big fat thing which would need gluten to keep it together, chef opted to have a flatter version, almost omelette-like in consistency. The microscopic whitebait was superbly fresh and the texture was almost creamy.
The calamari came dry fried, and so remained crispy on the outside while wonderfully chewy on the inside. No sauces were necessary and the generous wedges of lemon really sufficed. The parmiggiana was fantastically simple, yet drenched in summery tomato, salty pecorino and melty aubergines. They forgot our octopus salad.
Tana del Lupo have an exquisite wine list. It is also one that you will probably need help with. Don’t be shy about asking for help: at El Bulli, 70 per cent of diners ask for it when it comes to wine, so why should it be any different here? There are some local exemplars, but you should go wild with the Italians. The selection covers each region and the prices are, if not cheap, then good value for money. For a little more than €38 you can sample something like the Sta Cecilia from the Planeta winery. There are no years listed and no descriptions. We all know by now that a vintage can vary immeasurably from one year to the next - not having the year listed means that the restaurant can take diners for an almighty ride should it feel like.
In this case, we weren’t. Moreover, for the first time ever, the wine was decanted into a one-serving decanter attached to the bottle. I had never seen this before but it works. The sommelier told us that we can buy the decanter from the restaurant. At €25 a pop, I decided that I’d much rather buy a bottle instead.
We all opted for meat. The bistecca alla fiorentina and the t-bone milk fed veal were almost perfect: seared on ferri and left to rest. The fillet side, which was fatter, was extremely good but the strip loin side was over-cooked and slightly chewy. The Writer’s and the Gay Best Friend’s veal were impeccable. We returned a couple of days later, and the brown meagre was divine.
Sides are a simple salad and sautéed potatoes. The latter may have come out of a packet but they were extremely moreish so nobody really bothered commenting.
Sadly, by the time we ordered desserts, the 7-strong list had run out and we only had a choice of tiramisu or profiteroles drenched in chocolate. The Corporate Lawyer had the latter and frankly devoured them. “Are you going to lick the plate?” I asked him “If you say another word, I most definitely will.” He is Gozitan; nothing would surprise me.
Any disappointment from the lack of choice was quickly quashed when we dug into the tiramisu: it is a heaven of cream and chocolate and for once in my life, I would not have complained if the portion were twice the size.
It is sad that the young waiter was so chippy, that the desserts had run out, that service dips after your main course (on both visits) that the choice of fish on the first night was not exactly mind-bending and that, regardless of how nicely they have done up the place, there are still two television sets lowering the tone. It is even sadder that Tana insist on charging patrons the ludicrous and out-dated cover charge: it was not the €1 per person that we minded, but the fact that cover charges are greedy. Oh, the lack of prices for certain wines on the list produces some nasty surprises come bill time too.
Moreover, considering that we spent more than €250 on our first night, one would have expected a free limoncello or amaro at the end. There were none.
Did we like it? Hell, yeah. Would we return? Of course; we did and we’ll do. London, Paris and Dubai have fantastic eateries, but just in case that’s not on your agenda of a Saturday night, it’s good to know we have an arm of Sicily right here in Malta. And a smiley one too.

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