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Off The Hook Seafood Restaurant

Nov 05 2014.

One of the latest seafood restaurants in Colombo serving seafood and seafood alone, is Off the Hook Seafood Restaurant and Bar. Situated down Park Road where the former Korean Bakery was, this is one restaurant with a lot to offer their customers.

Owned by Chavan Mendis who is also behind The Bavarian German Restaurant, you can tell that he has taken every aspect of this seafood dream very seriously and meticulously. From the decor to the menu the restaurant screams seafood while the atmosphere is friendly and inviting.

He makes sure that the produce used to create the delicious dishes are fresh and bought on a daily basis while he even manages to keep the prices extremely reasonable. One of the noteworthy aspects of the restaurants is that the bread they use is baked on a daily basis – so every time you head to the restaurant you are guaranteed that the bread basket or in this case platter, will have a different assortment of breads served with a dip instead of butter (if you prefer butter though, go ahead and request for some).

Among the delectable seafood on offer is their wonderful and very reasonably priced sushi and sashimi. The sushi comes in a serving of six pieces and the prices range from Rs 700 for Spicy Tuna Roll with Tempura Crumbs to Rs 970 for the Volcano which includes Tempura Prawn, Avocado, Crab Stick and Fish Roe and when you bite into the latter the little balls of fish roe create a crunchy sensation in your mouth. While a really interesting roll was the Crispy Salmon Skin Roll (Rs 680) which was coated in deep fried curry leaves – which I felt was a very interesting twist and Chef Kelum tells me it is the first of its kind here in Sri Lanka.

The Nigiri and Sashimi ranges from Rs 660 for Aburi nigiri (calamari blow torched with tonkatsu sauce to Rs 820 for Shake (Salmon) Sashimi. One of my favourites in this range was the Gunkan maki (two pieces) which includes spicy tuna salad, crab meat or spicy salmon (Rs 890).

If you’d like to try out an assortment of sushi and sashimi go for the Moriawase Platter – a combination platter for four (Rs 3,830) or a Moriawase Bench – a combination platter for two (Rs 1,920).

Chavan told me that the Jaffna Style Jumbo Prawn Curry (Rs 790 for 100g) with fresh Homemade Curry Leaves Roast Paan (Rs 60) and Pol Sambol (Rs 40), prepared by Chef Sumith and his staff, is one of the most popular items on the menu. It was easy to understand why as the prawns were juicy and delicious and the bread soaked in the gravy topped with coconut sambol was just so simple, full of flavour and absolutely delectable.

Another of the mains we dug into was the Teriyaki Sauce Salmon (Rs 660 for 100g). Just writing about it makes my mouth water as the salmon had a perfectly crispy skin while the meat was juicy and teriyaki sauce complimented this dish perfectly.

The concept behind the mains is that you choose the seafood you like (which is priced at 100g and varies depending on the market price), you then choose which way you'd like it prepared – Sri Lankan, Thai, Chinese, Western or Japanese and finally decide on a side dish and you are good to go. The menu also consists of starters and soups.

They have three interesting options for dessert. We dug our way into the Off The Hook Dessert Experience (Rs 870). This colourful and delicious sweet indulgence includes a soft and crunchy Almond Cream Sandwich, a light strawberry and avocado Panna Cotta, a creamy Crème Brûlée and sinfully rich Chocolate Lava Cake.