Kingsbury Hotel’s Honey Beach Club (HBC) is an elegant pool bar and lounge.  They’ve got the view, the ambience, the drinks and now, the food! They have just introduced an all new pizza menu with 12 exciting flavours and we dropped by to see what’s on offer.

AMBIENCE 

The HBC is at the Kingsbury Poolside which has been converted into a small lounge with a live DJ spinning a few tracks. They boast a beautiful view of the Indian Ocean, also privy to many breathtaking sunsets. The atmosphere is lively and is the perfect place for a few cocktails and tapas with friends after work. 

FOOD

HBC just launched its new pizza menu by introducing 12 distinct toppings. We started off with their Smoked Salmon and Avocado pizza (Rs.1900) and their Tuscan Pesto Chicken and Bacon (Rs. 1800). The smoked salmon and avocado was a dynamic combination and the Pesto Chicken and Bacon pizza was slathered in pesto sauce and was generously packed with oven roasted chicken, bacon and button mushrooms. 

We then tried their Piri Piri Chicken pizza (Rs. 1,600) and Smoked Cured Pepperoni pizza (Rs.1,550). The Piri Piri Chicken was subtly flavoured and had a mix of interesting ingredients. The Smoked Cured Pepperoni pizza was pure yum with its thin crust and thin slices of pepperoni topped with a healthy dose of mozzarella cheese.

Next up we went for their Porknado (Rs. 1,700) and their Capricciosa (Rs. 1,600). For pork fans the Porknado is absolute heaven! The pizza was packed with all kinds of pork delights such as pulled pork, crispy bacon and smoked cured pepperoni and the smoky BBQ sauce was the perfect complement to it.  Their Capricciosa is a topping of chicken ham and mushrooms which goes well with a dash of chili flakes. 

Our favourites however were saved for last. The chef at HBC has got creative and introduced two new toppings that we never would have considered to work. The Sweet Potato Vegan Lovers pizza (Rs.1,200) is a vegetarian pizza with sweet potato and button mushrooms. It’s refreshing to find an exciting vegetarian topping that’s not your cliché cheese and tomato or mushroom and bell peppers so we were excited to try it out. The Sweet Potato and the mushroom together doesn’t produce much flavour because they are both bland vegetables but if you sprinkle a handful of oregano or chili flakes, the pizza is a mouthwatering sensation and something any one would enjoy, vegetarian or not. 

The other out of the box pizza taking on a very localized twist was the Fiery Chili Coconut Chicken pizza (Rs. 1,650) which (if the name didn’t give it away) is spicy chicken topped off with coconut flakes. The flakes weren’t really the grated flakes but rather small chunks of coconut you can munch on. The coconut flakes added a lovely crunch to the pizza and also neutralised the spicy chicken.  If pineapple works on a pizza – why can’t coconut work as well?  

All in all, their pizzas were delicious. Freshly baked, with a thin crisp crust, these pizzas were authentic and because we really can’t find fault in a pizza that doesn’t skim on the cheese, generous!

DRINKS
With just a few minutes to the sunset we thought some cocktails would be perfect for the occasion. We opted to try their signature cocktails to see what the HBC really has to offer.  We ordered their Honey Beach Crush (Rs.990) and Honey Flower Crush (Rs.990). 
With Rockland premium white rum, pineapple, brown sugar, lime and crushed basil leaves, the Honey Beach Crush had a tangy taste to it that we enjoyed.  It was also perfectly balanced as the rum took an equal footing with the other flavours of the drink.

Our favourite however was the Honey Flower Crush.  A mix of Rockland Dry Gin, Cointreau, Elderflower Syrup, Lime Juice and Tonic, this drink was topped off with rose petals and stands to be one of the prettiest cocktails I’ve ever seen! The cocktail was not just aesthetically pleasing; it was also a great mix of flavours and is a drink we’d definitely recommend.

OVERALL 
Overall, the HBC is a perfect evening spot. This is the kind of place you want to come to after work to sip a fancy cocktail, eat some great pizza and watch the sun crash into the ocean with some mellow background music. 

Pictures by Zeeshan Akram Jabeer