Stonegrill Dubai

We donned our bibs and cooked ourselves a pretty tasty steak at Dubai's most tempting-smelling spot 2 Reviews

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Stonegrill Dubai is a surreal concept, if only because it’s tucked away far away from anywhere anyone would consider eating. Buried inside a corner of the Gold & Diamond Park – a mall dedicated entirely to jewellery – the restaurant specialises in the stonegrill. According to the menu, this is the ‘hottest concept in dining’, and involves cooking steak on a heated stone at your table.

Apparently, the management feel this alone is not quite weird enough, and also offer an extensive Russian menu alongside the standard stonegrill menu. How very Dubai of them.

Not knowing quite what to expect, but with strong suspicions it would be odd, my first feeling upon entering the restaurant was relief: it smelled divine. The enticing aroma of juicy beef hung thick in the air, sparking carnivorous belly rumbles. Sufficiently beguiled, my date and I took to our table, only to be dealt a blinding reminder of the strangeness of our whereabouts.

Stonegrill’s windows look out at the mall’s floodlit car park; the glare of said floodlights invades the eyes wherever you sit. The whole experience made us feel a bit like war criminals under interrogation.

Keen to get cooking on the stone post haste, I ordered stone-grilled Portobello mushrooms with a cheese dipping sauce to start. The most enormous mushrooms I’ve ever seen turned up on a stone slab. As they sizzled away, I dipped into my date’s red pepper houmous, which proved tantalisingly tangy and came with an endless supply of warm pitta for scooping.

When finished, I was delighted with my Portobellos, which were bursting with flavour, their dense meatiness lacking the slimy texture that can accompany inferior fungi. The hot cheese sauce was rich, but not sickly, and made a delicious accompaniment.

Expectations now thoroughly raised, the mains did not disappoint. ribeye arrived raw on the stone. Our attentive waiter demonstrated how to cut up the meat and cook, but not before adorning me in a Stonegrill bib. (The steak was so good that I soon forgot this small humiliation and nearly went home in it). The stone cooks fast, meaning our fries were still warm when the meat finished.

My steak was drool-inducingly succulent – in part due to the quality of the cut, but I like to think it was also due to my skills on the stone. My date’s wagyu burger was pretty great too. Cheese and bun were standard, but the burger was notably tastier than most, as tender and taste-bud pleasing as you’d expect from wagyu.

OK, so this isn’t exactly high end dining. But if you’re looking for tasty, unfussy, reasonably priced grub, Stonegrill Dubai is a darned good bet. Who would’ve though that in the Gold & Diamond Park, there dwells a hidden gem?

The bill (for two)
1x Large Acqua Panna water Dhs22
1x Red pepper houmous Dhs16
1x Stonegrilled mushroom Dhs28
1x Wagyu burger Dhs55
1x ribeye Dhs80
Total (including service) Dhs201

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