JEDDAH: Let’s face it, when you fast in the month of Ramadan your mind inevitably wonders to thoughts of food and planning your iftar meal can be as exciting as sitting down to enjoy it.
When the designated chefs of the household want a break what could be better than slipping out your smartphone and ordering a hot, fresh meal?
Food delivery app Lugmety offers customers in Jeddah and Riyadh an array of restaurants within their vicinity, including homegrown dessert joints.
I love Italian food so for iftar this week, I decided to go for Il Gabbiano. Although it’s a beautiful restaurant, my guests and I were not willing to drive through the pre-iftar traffic so I scrolled through the Lugmety app and tapped my way to a hot meal.
We chose to treat ourselves to a dish of cotolette di pollo and a risotto all’aragosta. Since we were ordering Italian, we couldn’t resist the tiramisu. We all have a sweet tooth, however, so one dessert just wasn’t enough.
Fortunately, Lugmety allows users to order from more than one restaurant simultaneously — although we couldn't make use of the service, because the restaurant opens after iftar, we got our sweet fix for suhoor..
The mains arrived just in time for iftar and although I was a bit disappointed by the plain aluminum storage boxes used by Il Gabbiano, it was soon forgotten when we tucked in.
The lightly seasoned risotto was delicious and featured perfectly cooked grains topped with tender chunks of lobster meat — it was creamy and flavorful.
The costolette di pollo was a thin chicken breast coated in bread crumbs and crisped to golden brown perfection with a side of moreish fries and boiled vegetables, which were not overdone and were seasoned to perfection.
With mains out of the way it was time to dig in to the desserts. The soft, smooth tiramisu was melt-in-your-mouth good and boasted a thin layer of cocoa powder dusted on top.
As for the little dumplings of deliciousness from Luqaimat, our pistachio and dark chocolate-topped dough balls were gone within minutes later that evening owing to the crunchy outer layer, the cloud-soft interior and syrupy, hot sauce.
