Located at: Old Dutch Hospital Complex Echelon Square, Hospital St, Colombo 01, Sri Lanka

Visited on: 19 Jul, 2019

This visit came quite a long time after the last one, and I was harbouring fond memories of a few tasty dishes I’d had here before. It was a pleasant afternoon, so we decided to dine al fresco. I have to say, the fresh Watermelon Juice (LKR 400) was quite good. Refreshing, with a pleasant sweetness. I would like to maintain the assumption that its great taste stemmed from the fruit being really good rather than some form of sweetener being added.

For our first main dish, we actually wanted to order a portion of Bourbon Pork Chops, but unfortunately were told that it was unavailable. So, we went with the Grilled Pork Ribs with Angry Sauce – seasoned and grilled pork ribs topped with a secret angry sauce, served with horseradish and mashed potato (LKR 2,240). The ‘secret angry sauce’ tasted Tabasco-based and, in my opinion, lacked character. A touch of savoury sweetness with the spice in the sauce would have been nice with the ribs – speaking of which, the ribs definitely felt more boiled than grilled. So much so that the meat could just be pulled off the bone. The ‘grilled’ element had been left to a minimum. To specifically describe it as ‘seasoned’ was also a bit of an overstatement. Not quite what we were looking forward to. The mash was decently seasoned and creamy, and the steamed veggies were fine. I’m not sure where the horseradish was supposed to be – in the mash or among the veggies – but I didn’t come across any.

The second dish we ordered was their Chilli Prawn Alioli – plump and succulent grilled prawns tossed in chilli oil and garlic with shoestring pasta (LKR 1,625). The prawns were definitely sizeable and had been grilled to perfection – crunchy and not charred. The pasta had absorbed the seafood flavour from the prawn well too. The dish, as a whole, was a bit too oily for my liking but, to be fair, the description did mention that it was tossed in chilli oil. Overall, a satisfactory dish.

This particular visit left me feeling a bit nostalgic, reminiscing notes on the palate from visits past. I’m still a huge fan of Harpo’s pizza, but has Colombo Fort Café, too, lost its magic like its sister, The Commons? (https://theeatlog.com/2017/09/23/the-commons/) I certainly hope not.

Yummy Rating: 3.0 / 5.0