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Rialto, Dubai restaurant review: “It’s Sexy. It’s Sophia Loren in Her Prime.”
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Rialto, Dubai restaurant review: “It’s Sexy. It’s Sophia Loren in Her Prime.”
Rialto, the signature Italian inside Dubai’s showpiece Jumeirah Marsa Al Arab, was always going to be chic. You come to expect such things in Dubai.
The Highs
The Lows
The Highs
The Lows
Weeks later, what lingers in my memories is Rialto’s cinematic, mid-century grandeur. The vaulted ceilings, curves, theatrical lighting, warm creams and contrasting deep ocean blues. It’s special. It feels sexy. It is Sophia Loren in her prime. It speaks to drinks at the bar with cicchetti – and who knows what after. Go to the Rialto Bar next door to decide.
It is no surprise that Jumeirah unfurled a Harry’s Bar oligarchverse given Marsa al Arab’s penchant for uber-luxury (Courtney Brandt reporting here and here).
Rialto's menu and food
You would be forgiven for hoping that these Venetian nods lead you towards a menu replete with classics. Oozing slopes of soft polenta and stewed octopus, thick Bigoli strands tangled in onions and the pungent thrum of anchovy rendered to their essence or baicoli biscuits dipped into a Recioto di Soave.
No, here the menu reads ‘Italy’s Greatest Hits’, like ossobuco alla Milanese, the beefy bistecca alla Fiorentina and the now-ubiquitous cacio e pepe. It’s a familiar shape in Dubai’s grand Italians: enough breadth to please everyone, which can end up meaning nothing declares itself. Rialto’s dining room already knows exactly what it is. The menu is still deciding. Even the cicchetti, the one course that borrows the restaurant’s own name, tells a story: salame Milano is Lombard, primo sale al pistacchio is Sicilian, and picanha, further down the same list, is Brazilian. Not a baccalà mantecato or a sarde in saor in sight
Weeks later, what lingers in my memory is Rialto’s cinematic, mid-century grandeur. It’s special. It feels sexy. It is Sophia Loren in her prime.
In come our starters. Yellowtail crudo shingled like tiles in brilliant yellow calamansi and lemon; fresh artichokes with Parmesan shavings and rocket (my highlight); courgette flowers stuffed with ricotta and a smoked scarmorza cheese, battered and fried, and a vivid crimson tomato tarte tatin with stracciatella prised open tableside and dressed in what I believe is basil oil, all chased down with flutes of Ferrari Brut.
We pause to take in the dining room a little longer. The little table lamps, the soft cushion of thick linen under my elbows and the cocoa-brown double-breasted waistcoats with blue trim on the servers. Dubai attracts all types, but for those coming to drink in some of its high life, there are worse places to start.
Does one go to an Italian restaurant without ordering a pasta? Our charming Puglian server (whose name escapes me, for shame) beams while dissecting, folding and stirring a sharing course of the stickiest, meaty, slow-cooked beef cheek fettucce tableside in a steel serving platter that would have come home with me if that wasn’t messy business. And theft. The rendered collagen of the beef cheek mingles with the suave Parmesan cheese, clinging to our fettucce like heart-stopping ribbons. There are worse ways to die.
A fist-sized tuna steak is tall, thick and blushing pink, almost healthy, but for a lagoon of green peppercorn sauce thick and rich enough to trace your name in. It is an act of sheer greed following the fettucce.
As if by protocol, Nonna-sized helpings of tiramisu are doled from a tray – light, airy and creamy as you dare.
Rialto, Would I Come Back?
Yes, but largely to marvel at the dining room’s ode to Italian 1950s grandeur, nursing a brisk Ferrari and grazing through the cicchetti or just boulder through to the main courses. Rialto is a classy affair. In my opinion, it sits in conversation with Dubai’s grandest Italian restaurants like L’Amo Bistro Del Mare, my beloved Alici, Il Borro and maybe Chic Nonna. But this is a crowded field, and against it Rialto’s advantage is the room, not yet the plate. And I wonder about the well-heeled guests walking through a hotel as showpiece as Jumeirah Marsa Al Arab: aren’t they worldly enough to recognise a very good Italian restaurant when they see one, and to notice, perhaps even quietly reward, a menu with a point of view to match the room?
Rialto, Who Should Go?
Come for special-occasion date nights, corporate entertainment, and someone else picking up the tab.
Rialto, Review Information
Liam was invited to Rialto; therefore, he did not pay the bill, but this is what dinner would have cost based on Rialto’s online menu.
Visits: 1
Dishes (spend in AED): cicchetti salame Milano (40); primo sale al Pistacchio (45); classica focaccia di recco (120); yellowtail crudo, calamansi and lemon (120); artichoke salad, parmesan and arugula (120); fried courgette flowers, ricotta and smoked scarmoza cheese (115); tomato tarte tatin and stracciatella (130); fettucce pasta, beef cheek and Parmesan Cream (290); tuna steak and green pepper sauce (200); asparagus (65); tiramisù (60); black lemon and merengue (55); Terlaner Winkl bottle (750).
Licensed? Yes, both alcohol and pork.
Total Spend (AED): estimated AED 2110.
Liam is a food and travel writer based in the Middle East. He co-authored The Rise of Indian Food: Recipes Reimagined by Trèsind Studio, out now and available here. Published by Phaidon Press. Photography by Shresth Maloo. He owns EatGoSee and contributes to other publications. You can find Liam on Substack, Threads and Instagram.
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