The new restaurant adds Asian accents and a playful spin to French fine dining.
Atelier House Hospitality is on a roll – the F&B consultancy firm behind Michelin-starred 11 Woodfire, award-winning DIFC restaurant Marea, and popular homegrown concept Mohalla has just launched RSVP Restaurant, proving that fine dining doesn’t have to be uptight. Located in Boxpark and anchored in the ‘joie de vivre’ of dining, it combines the elegance of an old-world French eatery with a Mediterranean touch and Asian flavours. Aesthetically, the space has been conceived as a collector’s dining room decorated with the spoils of voyages over time.
RSVP Restaurant is spearheaded by Aadel Ouaoua, a Chef de Cuisine with considerable Michelin-starred background and over 20 years of international gastronomic expertise, working at highly acclaimed restaurants under some of the world’s greatest culinary minds – Michelin-starred Le Quinzième Paris by Chef Cyril Lignac, the renowned Girafe Paris alongside Chef Benoît Dargère, and the Michelin-recognised Nobu Park Lane included. Commenting on the opening, Ouaoua said, “My inspiration comes from my extensive travels across the globe and my love for French-Mediterranean cuisine combined with a deep affection for Japanese culinary techniques. Marrying these three elements results in RSVP’s unique offering, which fuses the complexities of French cuisines with influences of Asian textures and flavours. I am very excited to introduce guests to this eclectic culinary experience, which I feel is the perfect fit for a melting pot of global cuisines, such as Dubai.”
Born and raised in Lyon, an undeniable capital of gastronomy, the chef discovered his love of cooking when he joined two Michelin-starred Mayfair restaurant The Square by Phil Howard, which brought back fond memories of his childhood spent at his family restaurant in France. Not your typical French chef, Ouaoua has a passion for classic Japanese techniques and a Mediterranean touch, both of which are captured in RSVP’s carefully curated menu. Highlights include dishes such as carpaccio of sea bass with stracciatella basilic oil and raspberry, wagyu tartare on a slice of freshly toasted brioche with a touch of fine Russian Osetra caviar, finely sliced yellowtail topped with ginger and chives, Côtelette d’agneau in teriyaki sauce, and more. For a sweet finish, guests can enjoy desserts such as Madagascar vanilla chouquette with chocolate sauce and millefeuille revisité, which can be washed down by innovative mocktails such as the RSVP Bramble that pairs non-alcoholic gin with basil and smoked fresh pomegranate.
Panchali Mahendra, Managing Director of Atelier House Hospitality, said, “The opening of RSVP marks AHH’s first leap into French cuisine, and we are thrilled to be able to introduce such a unique culinary concept to the region. We aren’t ones to follow the conventional route and we wanted our foray into French dining to be different than existing, traditional concepts and we feel that RSVP is the perfect representation of contemporary French cuisine that diners would find in Paris today. We felt that the name RSVP – a French abbreviation of répondez s’il vous plait and now the universal phrase to confirm attendance – is a clever way to allude to the restaurant’s French identity, whilst also making the word easy to remember and roll off the tongue.”
DSCVR: RSVP Restaurant, BoxPark, Al Wasl Road, Dubai (04 265 5007). @rsvprestaurant
