FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL

Mother Earth Degustation Menu, Flour Rises

Mother Earth Degustation Menu

Words: Meg Alice
Photos: Rich Callahan

Welcome back to FLOUR® Rises, an Indian-French fine dining experience. As promised, following our review of FLOUR®’s “Heart of the Sea” spring menu, Chef Yogesh Upadhyay invites The Yum List back to experience the vegetarian interpretation of the same menu called “Mother Earth.” I jump at the opportunity because I am passionate about FLOUR® but not about going vegetarian. If I am going to expand my culinary experience and embrace a meatless/fishless/poultry-free meal, I know that FLOUR® is the place to start.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
FLOUR® Restaurant

Mother Earth Degustation Menu

Yum List photographer Rich has a different experience than me with the Mother Earth menu. He comes into the meal with a clean slate. I, however, could not help but refer to the seafood version. Chef Yogi comments that he ruined me for the vegetarian version because I am constantly comparing it to my last review. He’s wrong. I surprise myself in that my conclusion is that seafood, while I adore it, overwhelms flavours like truffle, ajwain spice (new to me), portobello, turmeric, and even mustard seed. FLOUR®’s vegetarian menu is a cleaner, clearer version of Chef Yogi’s spring menu.

I also have a hypothesis that vegetarian is a better option for a degustation menu because 10 to 12 non-vegetarian courses are too much food for one meal no matter how perfectly proportioned the dish sizes. I sleep better after Mother Earth.

To understand Chef Yogi and his philosophy of an open mind and giving yourself over to his culinary vision, please refer back to our prior reviews. Let’s jump into Mother Earth, travelling from Gujarat to Calcutta in springtime.

Bread – Mother Earth Degustation Menu

Being a restaurant that leaves no detail forgotten, FLOUR® starts by serving their homemade croissants and flatbread with sesame. The bread is delicious enough to be featured in its own bakery. The accompanying cumin butter has become of favourite for me in KL.

FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL
Bread

Circle

Both the vegetarian and seafood menus start with the same animal-free appetizer comprised of three amuse bouche and three tuiles served on a circular dish. Chef Yogi has changed the puffed pomme frites to a tart as the vehicle to hold the delectable tamarind yoghurt. I like both versions, but the new one is easier to eat. The taco is playful, holding paneer, the Indian version of ricotta cheese. The trio of delicate tuiles highlights orange, mango, and strawberry flavours. The freeze-dried strawberry remains the most intense.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
Circle – Mother Earth Degustation Menu

Earth and Sea (Chickpea Caviar)

Caviar does not only mean fish egg. It also means a delicacy or something too special for mass consumption. Chef Yogi has repurposed chickpeas to serve as the caviar with the same coconut-ginger espuma accompanying the fish caviar and uni from his seafood menu. The chickpeas are ground into flour and baked into small roe-shaped balls. The outsized crunch is straight-up fun like Cheez-It’s but is also delectable and unique, living up to the caviar name.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
Earth and Sea

Amour de Deutz 2010 Brut Millesime

The wine pairing for the caviar course is the Amour de Deutz 2010 Brut Millesime. This is a fantastic Cuvee champagne with a light yellow-green colour, slight fruitiness, minerality, and extra dry. It is from the renowned Deutz family winery in Champagne, France, dating back to 1838.

FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL
Amour de Deutz 2010 Brut Millesime

Plant (Portobello Mushroom Kebab)

This course is when the Mother Earth menu gets lift for Rich and me. In the biggest departure from the Heart of the Sea menu, Chef Yogi has replaced the Indian guacamole prawn with an earthy ground portobello mushroom kebob. It is served on a lollipop stick with an onion shooting out and Spanish red capsicum chutney sauce that has the same visual effect as ketchup. Being my third time at FLOUR®, I expect the second course to showcase Dr Suess’s playfulness and for it to take the furthest departure from traditional cuisine.

The mushroom kebab – featuring Polish portobellos — is substantial and nourishing, reminding me of something that a vegetarian hobbit would serve. If there is one dish I would like to see replicated and sold as a non-fine dining version, it is this one. I recognize the portabella flavours but not the additional spices, like ajwain or bishop’s weed, bringing bitterness to the dish. Discovering new flavours is one reason I will not turn down an opportunity to eat at FLOUR®.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
Plant

Shorba (Soup course)

From my last review, you’ll know I’m obsessed with Chef Yogi’s soups. They are emotional, simple, and the most authentic to South Asian village food. I’ve had his Nepalese thukpa soup from the winter Charcoal menu and now the shorba. Shorba is different from a soup or stew and has few added ingredients beyond tomato, cumin, and chilli. The liquid is pure like a consomme. Chef Yogi uses imported Spanish tomatoes, which have a deep, brick red colour.  To accompany the shorba, Chef Yogi has added Kenyan sweet snap peas, replacing the pearled Scottish scallops. The snap peas make another welcome appearance in the final course. We also enjoy a crisp focaccia cracker.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
Shorba – Mother Earth Degustation Menu

Maison Roche de Bellene’s 2018 Bellenos

The portobello kebab and shorba are paired with a 2018 rosé from the wine trading company Maison Roche de Bellene’s Bellenos, or pleasure collection. It originates from Beaujolais, France, known for its Gamay noir grape. Its bright minerality and fruit complement the garden tomato flavours.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
Maison Roche de Bellene’s 2018 Bellenos

Turmeric and Mustard (Baby Corn)

The next course is fried baby corn served with white asparagus from France. It is served with duelling spices of turmeric and mustard seed in fresh cream and wasabi pearls. The result is a beautifully balanced and seasoned dish, again with no other ingredients besides what has been stated. By replacing the seafood element (abalone), the farm flavours rise even higher.

FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL
Turmeric and Mustard

2018 Jean Javillier & Fils Meursault

The corn is paired with the crisp 2018 Jean Javillier & Fils Meursault. In FLOUR®’s last degustation menu, this same wine was paired with the octopus and monkfish. In the Heart of the Sea, it is paired with abalone. The citrus and minerality are excellent with seafood and fried corn.

FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL
2018 Jean Javillier & Fils Meursault

Kerala (Beetroot and Celeriac)

The next course mimics thoran, a dried vegetable dish served with coconut hailing from the Indian state of Kerala. The dish is beetroot and celeriac layered mille-feuille style served with a curry coconut sauce and tempered spices. There is a lot of chef skill in this artistically composed and colourful dish. This is what I imagined for vegetarian fine-dining, not the mushroom kebab. I commend Chef Yogi for serving both on the same menu.

Tempering is a reference to a specific style of heating the spices, such as the mustard seed, until it crackles and then leaving it to infuse the oil. This packs the flavour into the dish jazzing up the beetroot and celeriac. The coconut curry is balanced. Like the baby corn dish, without the seafood flavours, the spice is more forward.

FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL
Kerala – Mother Earth Degustation Menu

2018 Etienne Sauzet Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune Blanc “Jardin du Calvair”

The thoran is paired with a new wine for FLOUR®, a white Burgundy from Etienne Sauzet winery and subregion of Hautes Code De Beaune. It is the 2018 “Jardin du Calvair.” It is woody and floral, which works well with the pop of mustard seed and curry.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
2018 Etienne Sauzet Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune Blanc “Jardin du Calvair”

East and West Coast (Leek)

Our main course is a meaty charred leak replacing the Arctic black cod. The dish is deconstructed into three plates: the leak, rosematta rice, and a shallot curry. Each component is deceptively simple in its construction. In fact, the photos (pre-truffle shavings) depict three humble bowls of food. Don’t be deceived by the understated plainness of this dish; it is a powerhouse.

Each of the vegetarian interpretations of the spring menu has been masterful, but this is my favourite rendition. It turns out I don’t need the cod; in fact, the seafood in the Heart of the Sea Menu is a distraction to the earth and spice. I would readily order this dish anytime with leeks over cod (and I love cod). The shallot curry adds another savoury element. The rosematta rice imported from India is unique among rice varieties. Chef Yogi adds little snap peas from Kenya for a slight change of texture and sweetness.

The big revelation for me is that the generous helping of shaved Italian truffle adds ten times the flavour in the leek version compared to the cod. In hindsight, the truffle was lost when paired with cod, presumably because the fishiness overwhelms it. I didn’t know this about truffle and fish. The coarse and red-coloured rice which tastes like an ancient grain also rises higher in the leak version. I am surprised by my reaction.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
East and West Coast

Bourgogne Domaine Hudelot-Baillet 2018 Pinot Noir

The final wine pairing is the Burgundy-based Hudelot-Baillet winery’s 2018 Pinot Noir. It is a full-bodied Pinot Noir with juicy berries and floral notes. It works well with the hearty rice, charred leek, and truffle.

FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL
Bourgogne Domaine Hudelot-Baillet 2018 Pinot Noir

Now We Are Free (Dessert)

There are three desserts to this degustation menu plus digestive chocolates. Chef Yogi has kept the first dessert from his Charcoal menu but has significantly altered it since the last review. It is a bowl of cream and sultans with more subtle notes, less cognac, less chocolate, and more berries. Chef Yogi explains that he changed it by popular demand for something more recognizable as a dessert. Having tried three versions of it, the thru-line is the voluptuous Persian sultans and the Gladiator theme music on the sanitized headphones.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
Now We Are Free – Mother Earth Degustation Menu

Ice and Cream (not ice cream!)

This deconstructed ice cream is ice and cream. The mango sorbet with a hint of ginger and no added sugar sits next to the cream drops. The South Asian-ness of this dessert is the mango sourced from Pakistan, which has more varieties of mangoes than the West has for apples. There is no added sugar as the mangoes are served at peak ripeness. The dessert is shaped like a tree which reminds me of sitting in a summer orchard eating orange creamsicles from my childhood.

Mother Earth Degustation Menu
Ice and Cream (not ice cream!)

Passion of the Fruit

The souffle is a force of nature and chemistry experiment. Chef Yogi and his team nail the timing of serving the smoking hot souffle at the precise right moment following Ice and Cream, which means they predicted 16 minutes prior when we would be ready for it. Warm clouds overflow from the ramekin, which are broken up by the apricot sauce poured into it table-side. In retrospect, this might be a vegetarian cheat since it has eggs, but I enjoy it too much to think of this at the time.

FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL
Passion of the Fruit – Mother Earth Degustation Menu

Digestive – Mother Earth Degustation Menu

As with the Charcoal and Heart of the Sea tasting menus, we conclude with a piece of award-winning Malaysian Kelantan chocolate. We also sip on Hennessy XO cognac and spicy masala tea.

FLOUR Restaurant Vegetarian Meal Special Occasion KL
Digestive

Mother Earth Degustation Menu

The FLOUR® Rises’ Mother Earth Degustation vegetarian menu is priced at RM 580 per person plus an additional RM 385 for the wine pairing. There are no add ons. The Heart of the Sea seafood interpretation runs concurrently with Mother Earth. It is priced at RM 780 plus an additional RM 495 for the wine pairing. The Heart of the Sea includes an Iranian imperial beluga caviar upgrade for an additional RM 199 per person. The seafood menu also includes a suckling lamb shank with biryani add-on for RM 150 and a wild roasted partridge add-on for RM 150.  

Call ahead to book your reservation. FLOUR® only takes 20 diners per night. There is no a la carte menu. Chef Yogi personally serves and explains every dish.

Reasons to try the Mother Earth Degustation Menu: Vegetarian fine-dining, the chance to meet the obstinate and passionate Chef Yogi, treating your palate to something cutting edge and new, learning about South Asia, rosematta rice, shorba or thukpa, excellent wine pairings

FLOUR® Restaurant
No. 12 & 14, Jalan Kamuning (off Jalan Imbi)
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 55100
+60 12 960 0053
www.flourrestaurant.com.my
[email protected]

FLOUR® is open from 6 to 10 pm nightly except Tuesdays. Make reservations in advance. There is a non-refundable reservation booking fee of RM 75 per person, which is applied to the meal.

Find more restaurants for special occasions here, and stay up-to-date on KL’s food and beverage scene here and here.

4 Comments

  1. Quite a welcomed medley of dishes! And I know exactly what you mean about how seafood can overpower the flavors. A place whose popularity is clearly evident by the reservation policy. But what a great reward when you are personally served by the chef.

  2. Finally some vegetarian degustation menu, don’t think I’ve came across one and I do know a few vegetarian friends.

  3. A class above the rest! I am intrigued by that ice and cream that is not ice cream!

  4. Everything looks so small!
    I need to bring my macro lens to capture these mini cuties.

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