Injy El-Kashef's boots are made for walking Some features of this city are wonderful; some better left unmentioned. Among the former is the fact that if one ventures by foot into just about any street you are sure to find a new place to eat within a short distance. Many were the times when I simply had to find a new spot to review, was extremely late for my deadline, somehow suffered a mental block that erased from my mind the location of any restaurant I had planned to visit and thus ended up taking a walk in a randomly-chosen area of the city. It always worked. This time we happened to be in Heliopolis; we also happened to be desperate. Hunger. Fatigue. Irritability. Where on earth was that new popular café? The cab driver was instructed to follow vague directions, and he did, mumbling, grunting, yet unable to protest, taking a warning from the looks on our faces. He heard us call friends on cell phones to figure out where to turn next, consulting together, disagreeing, resorting to rather inelegant adjectives every so often to describe the unreachable promised land. And then the solution hit me. "We'll get out here, thank you." "But do you know where you're going?" "Of course! What does it look like to you?" A wise man, he refrained from answering. And so began yet another short walk that led to a new discovery: Il Pescatore -- and adjacent to it, Gelateria di Roma. The restaurant was completely devoid of both people and character. Like a nouveau riche twit, the elements were all there, yet they failed to amount to anything impressionable. It was clean, tidy, on the elegant side, welcoming, affordable, dimly-lit, well-finished, marble-floored, well-attended. Yes, true -- and? We began with the menu's clever suggestion of an appetiser combination: a plate of tommiya (garlic paste), baba ghannoug, tehina and yoghurt salad; very good octopus salad; innovative and tasty breaded and fried vegetables (including onion and aubergines) and thin delicious strips of mozzarella cheese bathing in vinegar and olive oil. Next we shared a Pasta with Caviar. That's when things started getting shaky. The pasta was pasty, required cutting with a fork if we were to eat it without regressing to manners befitting a five year old. The cream sauce was obscenely rich. The caviar visible only under a microscope -- well, maybe there were a few specs that could be spotted by the naked eye. Accommodating souls that we are, we enjoyed it nevertheless but could not contemplate any more food. Before we could express ourselves however, the main courses had landed. The Mixed Seafood Grill was taken home in a doggy bag (and proved wonderful even out of the fridge many hours later), while the Piccata with Mushroom Sauce remained on the table. A few cigarettes to alleviate the heaviness of the pasta sauce and, fork and knife in hand, I summoned my courage to attack. The meat was chewy, rubbery and, eventually, ignored; the mushroom sauce received my due attention, for it was perfect. Not a drop of it remained by the time the LE144 bill arrived (including an unmentionably despicable lemon and strawberry sorbet for dessert). We ate and talked, our bodily needs were fulfiled, but we ain't going back there no more. Il Pescatore, 24 Al-Horreya St (near the crossroads with Al-Nozha St, opposite Esso gas station), Heliopolis Tel 414 7959/3067
