Click images to view larger versions

MOSAIC

THE BEST STORIES ARE IN THE DETAILS

PREMIER

Art in the bistro

A smart, important addition to the hospitality scene in Oman, the Art Café (Muscat City Centre, 24558176) raises the bar for the industry with an unbeatable mix of fabulous interiors, excellent food and attentive service. Done up, as one diner put it, like “an American interpretation of a French bistro,�the café serves everything from salads to steaks to ice creams to coffees. You will love the little marble tabletops, Toulouse Lautrec on the walls, French curlicues on the ceiling, and the upmarket look of wood, leather and stone. It’s all thrown together in a way Muscat hasn’t seen.

The café isn’t the cheapest, with the main dishes we ordered averaging between five and seven rials. The Santa Fe Salad (RO2.600) comes laden in a big bowl and is, like the rest of the food here, healthy and modern, with a light yogurt-based dressing. The Chicken Florentine (RO4.900) comes with a light creamy sauce, spinach and potato, and is good but straightforward. Try the Perfect Steak instead: a fresh take on what could have been predictable. Instead of one large mass of meat you get a handful of chunks of grilled meat. The sauce �mushroom or pepper �comes separately, which is a good idea because we thought the steak so good we preferred it without the sauce. Mashed potato comes mixed with strong mustard, perhaps too aggressive. Ours was a bit on the sour side. The apple pie is all right; the fried ice cream is better.

The same people who have introduced the Art Café will soon open Muscat’s first Coffee Republic, which has grown to become the UK’s best-known espresso bar brands, and whose selection, says international style magazine Vogue, “is awesome.�br>
ART

Saturation point

Jane Hodgson will be opening her exhibition Essential Oman at The Crowne Plaza Muscat at 7.30pm on October 21 and will also be taking part in Latitude �Art Without Borders, to be announced this month. Paintings range from earthy coloured landscapes to rural streetscapes featuring Omanis in brilliantly coloured clothing going about daily life. There are also some more abstract pieces featuring Arabic motifs or based on Omani window details. They are all multi-layered and textured, incorporating various techniques and materials, many taking up to a month to complete. Most canvases are quite large, some up to a metre square. “The paint,�explains Jane, is applied in unconventional ways, using ‘improvised�tools rather than controlling the paint through traditional application methods. Depth is achieved through multiple layers and washes. These paintings can be finished in oils and some are washed with gold or might incorporate gold leaf.�/span>

ART

Opening a season

To open the new season, the Bait al Baranda Visitor’s Centre just off the Corniche will be exhibiting a selection of more than 40 of Abdulmajeed Karoo’s paintings, titled Muttrah Doors, from October 18�3.

COUTURE

Bags from Beirut

Sarah Beydoun’s bags have graced the arms of Queen Rania of Jordan and French actress Catherine Deneuve, and will be exhibited at the Bait al Baranda from October 21 till November 1. Sarah belongs to a generation of Beirut-based designers who came of age during Lebanon’s 15-year civil war and are now injecting fresh life into the city.

For her master’s degree, she wrote a thesis on women prisoners in Lebanon. She realised she could combine her interest in bettering underprivileged women’s lives with her love for fashion. Sarah decided to set up her company as part of a rehabilitation programme, whereby women at risk from economic deprivation or its stigma would learn valuable skills in return for a reliable income and a stable source of pride, dignity and empowerment. In the process, these women would be helping to revamp the centuries�old traditions of artisans and textile makers in the Middle East and also invigorating contemporary fashion. Visit her work at sarahsbag.com.

CUISINE

Try the crab

The Marjan, a seasonal restaurant on the lawns of the Grand Hyatt Muscat, is now open after the summer, and promises delicacies from Singapore (black pepper crab), Indonesia (nasi goreng, mie goreng), Malaysia (rendang and lumpea) and Thailand (spicy lobster with pineapple). You can enjoy the Marjan through the day or evening; the restaurant, which can seat up to 85, is open from ten in the morning till half past ten at night, except Fridays, when it is only open till half past seven in the evening, and does not serve dinner.

Here, its chefs share the recipe for their famous black pepper crab:

Ingredients:

800g whole mud crab
40g corn flour
40ml oyster sauce
20ml sweet soya
20g spring onion
20g butter
20g crushed black pepper
15ml corn oil

Yellow marinade
Oil for frying
Steamed jasmine rice

And this is how to make the yellow marinade:

5g garlic
3g galangal
5g lemon grass
3g ginger
3g turmeric powder
Mix all ingredients and with a mortar and pestle grind them to a fine paste.

Method:

Wash the crab in running water ensuring it is free of sand and other impurities.
Clean the belly and cut the crab into four pieces. Dust with corn flour and deep-fry for five minutes. Heat the wok and sauté the yellow marinade for a few minutes in corn oil, then add water, oyster sauce and sweet soya.
Add fried crab and black pepper, toss and finish it off with butter. Serve hot, garnished with spring onion and steamed jasmine rice.