My weekend in Prague also meant going for dinner to an interesting restaurant. I looked a bit around before I decided to book a table at Portfolio Restaurant. The restaurant promised modern international cuisine and was also within walking distance from my hotel.
As amuse bouche I got a slice of potato with truffle crème fraiche and some kind of special ‘powder’. Probably not grated truffle, because the truffle taste was not very strong. It tasted good, creamy and the potato had room temperature. A very promising start.
as amuse bouche a slice of potato with truffled crème fraiche @Portfolio restaurant
The first course of the tasting menu was a scallop with butternut squash purée, small pieces of chestnut and chestnut sauce with truffle. I didn’t taste the truffle in the sauce which was fine by me. The sauce overall didn’t do much for me. The scallop was well seasoned and tasty. A little bit more color would have been great though. Maybe 30 seconds longer in the pan? The purée was tasty, the texture silky smooth and really good together with the scallop. The chestnut pieces though didn’t work texture wise with the rest, too hard and crumbly. Maybe skip the chestnut completely? The thinly sliced apple was fine but also didn’t do much to enhance the dish. Here purity would have worked better.
scallop with butternut purée @Portfolio restaurant
Foie Gras was the second course. Covered with pistachios it was delicious. The accompanying coconut lime foam didn’t work, the apple was good if maybe a bit too cold. I am not sure why the fried angel hair was on the plate but was okay. And the toast at the end was a bit dry and way to small for the foie gras in the first place. It could have been left off from the start.
foie gras with pistachios @Portfolio restaurant
Next up was fish. The third course was monkfish with curried lentils and fried red cabbage on top. The monkfish was good if maybe a tad too dry, the lentils maybe too curried and overall weird with the fried cabbage. Interesting dish in combination, but not mine. Not sure what it was that didn’t work for me. Maybe it was again that there was too much happening on the plate.
monkfish with curried lentils @Portfolio restaurant
Last but not least the meat course. The fourth dish was venison with potato fondant, topped with parsnip cream, kale, cherries and cherry sauce. The meat was perfect and combined with the kale delicious. The cherry sauce actually worked well in combination with the potatoes and the parsnip cream. Only the cherries themselves were off putting because they were way too sweet. This was definitely the best dish of the evening.
venison with kale and cherry sauce @Portfolio restaurant
Palate cleanser or pre-dessert was blueberry ice cream and sour cream. Nice presentation but nothing special.
blueberry ice cream and sour cream @Portfolio restaurant
I had asked to change the dessert to the gingerbread with walnut ice cream and pears. It was Christmas season after all and I felt that worked better than lime panna cotta. Maybe I should have stuck with it because the gingerbread was not a hit. It looked great but the chocolate sauce overpowered every other taste. And the little I could taste turned out to be bland. The pears were a bit too hard. Might have been cooked in saffron due to the color. It looked great but was just not a winner.
gingerbread with walnut ice cream @Portfolio restaurant
Overall the kitchen has a lot of good ideas, just some of them don’t work so well. Or at least not in these combinations. Less would have been a lot more here because the technical standard is high. I just wish they would have focused on the main ingredient instead of all the unnecessary extras. Yours, Pollybert
Portfolio Restaurant
110 00 Praha 1, Lannův Palác, Havlíčkova 1030
Tel: +420 601 063 092
E-mail: rezervace@portfolio-restaurant.cz
Mon-Fri: 11:30–14:00, 17:00 – 23:00, Sat: 17:00-23:00
https://www.portfolio-restaurant.cz/en
