Provo, UT 84601
Banana Leaf, is a restaurant that provides an experience meal! Any foodie adventurous will love Banana Leaf!! The featured menu items come from Singapore and Srilanka. Most of their entrees are cooked in a banana leaf (hence the name). The banana leaves are fresh and shipped from Florida, and give this restaurant an original edge.
What We Got...
It was girls night out with Jen, Stacie, and I. With three of us we got a good sampling of what they have to offer.
Drinks
Rich avocado blended with ginger, vanilla bean, cream and sugar. Don’t be intimidated by this green drink, it is sooooooo good. I now crave it! It has the perfect sweetness, with chocolate syrup, vanilla bean, whipped cream, and avocado. Plus if you put an avocado in anything BAM, instantly made healthy!
Fresh mangos pureed and blended with Sri Lankan yoghurt. Jen can’t resist mangos and naturally got the Mango Smoothie. Sometimes mango flavored drinks disappoint, but this was delicious and tasted just like a mango!
Appetizer
This reminded me of Naan (the flatbread served at Indian restaurants) but on a diet. It was thinner and seasoned with a garlic salt. I love anything with garlic and the pa’an was great.
Dinner
It came out on a huge leaf platter. The beef was almost like bbq beef strips. It was served with vegetables, a mixture of cheeses, egg, masala curry, spices, and shredded pa’an. It was tasty. I would say out of the three dishes I tried this was the least exotic tasting. It is a safe dish if you’re not feeling adventurous.
Order this dish mild or spicy depending on your spice meter. The shrimp, vegetables, and basmati rice were seasoned with the Chef’s secret sauce. Comes with 2 mussels on the side. I don’t recall ever trying mussels, so I thought I’d give it a try. I’m an adventurous foodie right? Today, I don’t regret trying it, but I know I NEVER want to eat another mussel in my life. Just the name brings back the rubbery, I can’t swallow this, experience I had (I did swallow, but it took a good 3 minutes of chewing before I could down it, ekk). For all you mussel fans you get not one, but two with this shrimp dish. Let me know before hand if you like’m and I’ll box them up and ship them to you, free of charge.
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| Wrapped and cooked in the banana leaf |
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| Unwrapped |
If monkeys wrapped their presents it would look something like this dish. Wrapped nicely in a banana leaf was seamed seasoned rices, a fried egg, curried chicken, potatoes, with sambols and chutneys. It was delicious. It reminded me of a tin foil dinner because everything was wrapped up and cooked together, but in a banana leaf. I never knew with each bite what flavor I was going to get.
Service...
The menu at first was overwelming, mostly because everything looked sooooo good and I couldn’t make up my mind. The waiter came by and asked if he could explain some of the menu items. He was great, and described the unique aspects of all the dishes. Once we ordered our food it came out quickly and someone was always around to fill up our water.
Overall..
Green light restaurant. I would make a quick stop to the Banana Leaf for another sip of the avocado shake!! I have nothing bad to say about this restaurant. It was a restaurant that let me travel the world through food, and that’s what I dream about!
Scale Rating Descriptions
Green Light: I'll be coming through all the time, call me a regular, recommend to everyone and all, I"ll crave this place when I'm pregnant, loved it!
Yellow Light: I'll be slow to go through, I'd go back if someone suggested it, nothing special, not something I'm going to crave, it was ok.
Red Light: STOP! Don't go, tried it once and that's enough, warn people not to go, thinking about it brings back bad memories, didn't like it.
To be fair I wouldn't judge mussels off this one experience. While they might be an acquired taste for some, they shouldn't be rubbery.
ReplyDeleteIf you ever see them on a French/Spanish menu in a broth, something like moules frites, or maybe the meijilliones at Finca, definitely give them a whirl.
My general rule of thumb in trying something new is only get the very best version of it the first time, in a restaurant that excels at it, or specialises, and take it from there :)
I like your rule. I think I will adopt it, if that's ok? :) I'll give them another try taking into a account your recommendations. I'm sure the mussel thanks you for opening the door again for him. Thanks for sharing!
DeleteOf course!
ReplyDeleteI decided on it many moons ago after I had my first caviar and was fairly non plussed. I had it again years later at a very swanky michelin starred french restaurant, and wow, turns out I do like caviar. Just can't really afford it on my weekly menu :)
Avocado shake? I just don't think my brain would let my mouth try it...
ReplyDeleteHaha, it's kinda like drinking green smoothies. If you didn't know it was green, you would never know the difference. The avocado shake was delish! But I'll stick by my choice of the mango smoothie.
DeleteNow you made me hungry. Gotta go to grab something to eat.
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