Rave Dines: Le Guilan, Dubai

Dubai has never wanted for Persian restaurants. Most of us could name one for kebabs, another for a long Friday lunch with the family, and a third we only mention to close friends because the tahdig is that good. Rarer is the Persian dining room that feels genuinely of its moment: one that knows the old recipes by heart, yet has the confidence to rearrange the furniture.

Le Guilan, which opened in September at the foot of DAMAC Maison Distinction overlooking South Ridge Park, arrives with a pedigree. Its founder, Amir Asjodi, is the man behind Guilaneh, the Tehran restaurant that has gathered something of a cult following over the years and become one of the city’s best-known tables. The Dubai address is no replica. Think of it instead as a younger sibling who moved abroad, picked up a little French and came home with sharper tailoring.

The name is the first clue. Gilan is the green, rain-soaked province on Iran’s Caspian coast, a landscape of rice paddies, tea terraces and sea mist. Its cooking stands a little apart from the saffron-and-kebab Persia most of us know: brighter, more herbal, fond of sour fruit, garlic and great handfuls of greenery. The region is also famed for a hospitality that borders on the insistent, and nobody leaves a Gilaki table hungry. Le Guilan appears to have adopted that last trait as a founding principle.

We dined inside on a Saturday evening, and it is a room that rewards a long sit. White Rhino Design Group, founded by Iranian designer Foad Fatemi, has resisted the obvious. There is no mirrored tilework here, no carpet pinned to the wall for effect. The reference point is the Parisian brasserie instead: softly draped curtains, handsome light fixtures, a pale and restful palette and, rarest of Dubai luxuries, proper breathing space between tables. Persia is present, but whispered rather than announced, chiefly through the art on the walls.

At one end, the open kitchen keeps up a low and purposeful hum, while above the pass, jars of house-made pickles and preserves stand in tidy rows like a well-kept larder. You can hear your companion without leaning in. It is polished without a trace of stiffness, which is far harder to achieve than it looks.

Every table at Le Guilan begins the same way, and it is a disarming opening move. Warm bread arrives alongside the house black butter, enriched with fermented black garlic until it takes on a deep, glossy umber. It is savoury, mellow and faintly sweet, with an almost balsamic depth, and we had cleared the dish before we had properly opened the menu. Consider yourself warned.

Hummus is a fair test of any kitchen’s discipline, and this one passed with ease: silken, dressed with a generous pour of olive oil and scattered with toasted pine nuts, with crisp pita chips for scooping. The real surprise was the cucumber and pine nut salad. It is seasoned with dalar, the vivid herb-and-salt condiment of Gilan that locals rub over sour plums and unripe fruit, then finished with a sherry vinaigrette and a scattering of edible flowers. Cool, crunchy and assertively seasoned, it is the most Caspian thing on the menu, and the dish we would send a friend back for.

The mains are where the French technique quietly shows its hand. The short rib, braised until it yields to the gentlest pressure of a fork, rests on fragrant dill rice beside a smooth fava bean purée, a knowing nod to baghali polo, the dill-and-broad-bean rice that has graced Persian tables for generations. Then there is the chocolate jus. On paper it reads as a provocation; on the plate it lends depth and a hint of bitterness rather than sweetness, binding everything together much as cocoa does in a good mole. Of everything we ate, this is the plate that best explains what Le Guilan sets out to do, and it does it beautifully.

The joojeh, meanwhile, is comfort food dressed for dinner. Half a bone-in chicken is marinated in saffron and yoghurt, grilled until its edges catch, and served over soft polenta with fine herbs and a glossy jus. Joojeh kebab belongs to every Persian family barbecue; here it gains a measure of ceremony without surrendering any of its warmth. Somewhere between the two plates, our table slipped into the familiar Persian ritual of passing dishes back and forth, which is, one suspects, precisely the point.

The refreshments list leans thoughtfully Persian, from a sekanjebin mojito built on the old vinegar-and-mint shrub to a golden lemonade laced with saffron. We chose the Citrus, a bright blend of orange, carrot, ginger, lemon and honey, with just enough warmth from the ginger to cut through the richer plates.

Le Guilan is open from breakfast through afternoon tea to dinner, and there is plenty we have already earmarked for a second visit. The saffron French toast, brioche soaked in saffron custard and caramelised to order, sounds like the ideal excuse for a slow weekend morning, while the saffron soufflé, perfumed with cardamom and rosewater and served with Persian saffron ice cream, is firmly on our list. As the weather cools, the garden terrace should come into its own too: around 50 seats framed by foliage and fairy lights, looking out across South Ridge Park.

Le Guilan does not set out to reinvent Persian food, and it is all the better for that restraint. It takes the flavours Iranians grow up with (saffron, dill, sour herbs and the comfort of a crowded table) and gives them a lighter hand and a finer wardrobe. Downtown is full of places designed to be seen in. This one is designed for lingering, and we fully intend to.

The Rave verdict: Caspian soul, Parisian polish and the most persuasive bread and butter in Downtown. Book a table, order the short rib and take your time.

Location: Le Guilan, DAMAC Maison Distinction, Downtown Dubai (overlooking South Ridge Park).

Serving: Breakfast, afternoon tea and dinner

Reservations: +971 52 966 8295

For more information, visit Le Guilan

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