There is something intensely alluring about O15’s Café: the moment you enter this pleasantly low-lit café with wood and brick interiors, your mood is instantly uplifted and you feel energized with the music and ambience. The spirit and aesthetic décor of this newly opened café, with interesting doodles on big, black walls, are both unique and striking, while the atmosphere is extremely warm and inviting!

Smoking is not allowed inside, although there is a separate space for the same. The café seems to be inspired by music of different kinds. Loud music is in perfect harmony with the ambience here. There is even music on the walls, which display musical instruments like tabla and guitar. At one corner, there is a pretty telephone booth, just apt for a cozy dinner on that special evening! Just opposite to it, there is even a stage for live musical performances, to enhance your O15’s Café experience.

So after a busy day, a curious group of Mumbai-based food bloggers headed on to O15’s Café at Four Bungalows, Mumbai, to explore what’s in store there, on the occasion of the café’s pre-launch party. It was an invitation-only party, where each of us were allowed to come with a friend. It was a fun rendezvous, where we, the foodies of Food Blogger’s Association of India (FBAI) enjoyed great food and outstanding drinks, in addition to spending good time together and getting to know about other food bloggers in the group. While I already had a wonderful company of my friend Gargi Das, I am glad that I shared my table with foodies like Pushpa Moorjani, Yeshi Chaudhary and Joel D’Souza. I would like to thank Sameer Malkani of FBAI and Reeti Dwivedi Khowal for inviting us for this wonderful experience!

O15’s Café’s delicious world cuisine is complemented by the flavourful selection of drinks. The variety of cocktails and mock tails is extremely impressive, along with signature Scotch and wines. Delectable cocktails having zippy bright notes are undoubtedly one of the strongest features here. O15’s Cafe offers you a casual dining experience, where there is ample choice to suit every palate. The menu not only has international fare, but a whole raft of comfort Indian food, blending interesting flavours.

What impressed us the most is that the food and drinks on offer are reasonably priced for the food quality, service and ambience. I can’t wait to come back for the cocktails: especially the orange-juice and rum-infused sweet Hurricane and the sea-salt-rimmed Minty-rita (mint-flavoured Margarita). These were so good that we ordered a few more later. As there were six of us on our table, each pair of us ordered two dishes and so, we ended up tasting a huge variety of dishes and relishing each bite with like-minded company.

For the starters, I couldn’t stop myself tucking into some Chicken basil tikka, Lamb souvlaki, Caprese salad, Chicken dumplings and Nachos with beans. The Caprese salad and Nachos with beans was liked by all. The desi chicken basil tikka was soft and succulent.

However, the Greek lamb souvlaki, in which spiced and grilled lamb cubes were served on skewers along with the tzatziki dip, was not upto our expectations in terms of tenderness. It was quite chewy, although the flavour was great. Food didn’t arrive as quickly as we had expected. The chicken dumplings had undercooked wrappers and tasted unimpressive, and it was overstuffed with chicken. The stuffing was tasty, but dry.

One of us also ordered the beguiling Chicken potli kebab: chicken drumsticks stuffed with marinated and spiced chicken mince, cooked in a tandoor. Finally, we ordered a deep-fried seafood platter, which had rings of calamari, fillets of basa and evergreen shrimps deep-fried until crisp.

We loved both these dishes as these were oozing with flavours and the presentation was appetizing too!

For the entrees, we ordered two dishes only. There was a worthwhile Norwegian salmon and the dissapointing Spanish seafood paella. In the lip-smacking salmon preparation, grilled salmon fillet was served on a bed of mashed potatoes infused with garlic and herbs. It was served with wilted spinach, exotic vegetables and lemon-caper sauce. While Norwegian salmon tasted awesome and looked great, the Spanish seafood paella was not upto the mark. The rice was under-cooked and lacked the authenticity, although it was served with Sofrito sauce, tortilla chips and re-fried beans.

At O15’s Café, hands-down some potent potions and yummy food that will wash down your daylong tiredness as you take the first sip and morsel! We loved all the cocktails we tried. Among the starters, we loved most of them, but the chicken dishes were brilliant. We also loved the fact that it has a plenty of vegetarian dishes to offer: vegetable au gratin, eggplant parmigiana, Asian-style paneer, sautéed mushrooms and paneer tikka are just some of the vegetarian options. We hope, in times to come, the menu will also include other meats apart from chicken and lamb. All in all, O15’s Café made me happy with its food and drinks. I look forward to my next visit there!