I’m always thrilled when restaurants open in Stavanger! Last night (October 8th 2022) we went to the grand opening of BRAVO in Pedersgata 71. The house has been restored and it is bright orange, so it is hard to miss. The interior was relaxed with wooden tables, retro chairs and with elements showing some of the original panels in the walls. There is space for about 20 guest or so and the small kitchen is completely open and that seems to be in fashion these days. I asked founder/owner/chef Daniel about the concept of BRAVO and he replied with a smile and said “we will focus on good food”. The menu is à la carte and there are snacks and small dishes. They aim to change the menu frequently so that you can get something different when you re-visit. There was also a decent wine list of reasonably priced wines, with more focus on natural wines compared to the traditional wines. We decided to have a few dishes to share and asked if we could start with a snack and two dishes and Daniel said we could get the food in whatever order we wanted - I guess this is the beauty of the concept.
We started with a ceviche of halibut (kveite in Norwegian) with sea buckthorn (tindved), pan fried hake (lysing) and toast with anchovies. I don’t think I have had ceviche on sea buckthorn before and this was delicious. I do like sea buckthorn and here we got lovely chunks of fish, onion and cancha. Cancha is a puffed jumbo corn and had a great starchy taste. The hake was amazing! Pan fried to perfection and with mouthwatering brown butter, creamy cauliflower mash and hazelnuts. It would have been lovely with a small bread to be able to scoop of the very last drop of that brown butter! The toast was crunchy and topped with ricotta, anchovies and just a bit of lemon. Great taste combinations but it would have been good with a warm bread.
The next round of food was pumpkin risotto and beef tartare. I love risotto and this was done right! Creamy, rich, lots of parmesan and with chunks of pumpkin. The tartare was also lovely as løyrom caviar was mixed in to give a bit of saltiness and it was served on some mayo. In the very end, I had some apple compote, vanilla custard and topped with granola.
Thanks BRAVO for a great meal in a relaxed atmosphere. Owners Rakel and Daniel seemed comfortable with running the place and seemed quite relaxed even if this was opening night! Congratulations on opening of a new restaurant!
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