Tasty but hasty

A friend from England came to stay last weekend while Monsieur Gourmand was away on business. Transforming myself into a tour guide, I devised an all-encompassing itinerary for us, relishing the prospect of using Geneva's free bike rental scheme. But nothing is ever simple in Switzerland...

My UK driving licence wasn’t official enough as a form of ID so I had to go back to the apartment for my passport. Then there weren’t any bikes available at the Villereuse office so we went to Place du Molard, only to find an empty prefab. The staff there told us there were two bikes at Bains de Pâquis, so across the water we went, arriving two seconds after a trout-pouted glamour puss, who promptly nabbed one of the last two bikes.

Luckily we didn’t have to wait long for a replacement and we spent the afternoon happily whizzing around town, from the botanical gardens and the UN to Carouge and the Jet d’eau.

In the absence of Monsieur Gourmand, I seized the opportunity to enjoy a Lebanese feast in the evening. But, having become engrossed – at my friend’s insistence – in a certain TV talent show, we didn’t sit down to eat at Le Diwane until 10pm. As with the pernickety passport incident earlier in the day, we were about to be reminded that spontaneity in Switzerland is a contradiction in terms.     
 

The waiter implored us to try a glass each of an open wine rather than the bottle of Lebanese white that we requested, presumably because he was worried we might take too long to drink it. The fact that the bottle would cost considerably more was by-the-by. Needless to say, his efforts were in vain and our hard-won bottle arrived with some very appetising mezze.

All too accustomed to shop-bought vine leaves, I had forgotten how soft and moist they can be until I tried these ones, while the dreamy, creamy houmous was offset by the healthy tasting and tangy tabbouleh.

Our main course – a mixed grill of marinated chicken and lamb – should have been a delight, but I couldn’t enjoy it. Feeling rather rushed and made to feel guilty for daring to eat so late – let’s not forget this was Saturday night in the liveliest area of a European city – I wolfed down the mezze in a flash and barely chewed the scrumptious chunks of meat.

At 11 o’clock on the dot, the restaurant lights were turned off, music muted and the tables and chairs quickly chained up. Taking the hint, we glugged down the last of our wine and hit the surrounding streets for a walk on Geneva’s wild side. Unfortunately the punters of Pâquis seemed to have us confused with the other kind of streetwalker, so we soon beat a hasty houmous-fuelled retreat towards home.

 Le Diwane, rue de Zurich 6, 1201 Geneva
+41 (0)22 732 73 91