Farmlore is a farm-to-table restaurant in Bangalore headed by Chef Ebenezer Johnson, that focuses on the performance art of the degustation menu. You book a ticket in advance and reach at a stipulated time. Like a piano recital or stand-up gig, you’re robbed of choice in terms of actual content, except for some basic options like veg or non-veg. Instead, you take a back seat, and wait as the chefs surprise and dazzle you with their creations.

The dinner service comprises a 10-course degustation menu, lasting over two and a half hours. It is slow-paced, and you can choose between a meandering conversation with your loved ones without having to bother about what to order next, or a seat at the chef’s table and watch edible art being created right before your eyes and served directly to you, like a bartender who deftly mixes the cocktail and pushes the prepared drink in your direction.

The courses roughly resemble the classical French menu, moving from amuse bouche, salad, eggs, fish, meat, sorbet, dessert, and petit-fours. The menu begins and ends with one-bite foods, acting as delicious and nifty bookends. The menu showcases an immense array of local and global ingredients, from Bannur lamb to Peruvian chocolate, each one of which is superlative in quality.

The menu focuses heavily on seasonality and local produce, and a lot of ingredients come from their own farm, like the tomatoes which yielded a flavour-bomb of a broth in the soup course, and the high-fat milk of Hallikar cows which is the inspiration behind their main dessert, which uses the milk in five different ways to create a bombshell of a dessert.

The menu also explores the trendy side of fine dining, with forays into molecular gastronomy, featuring “edible plastic” and “apple caviar” in their final course. The art of monochrome is manifest in the myriad shades of green in the salad course. Visual storytelling takes center-stage too, as in the sorbet course which is meant to evoke the mystique of space, or the fish course which masterfully places an edible flag of Bangladesh on the plate.

The chefs are extremely courteous, explaining the dishes as they are served and chatting with the customers along the way. It’s like having a meal at a friend’s place, if your friend is an incredibly qualified chef. The restaurant itself is located away from the hubbub of the city, the ambience is intimate, and the pace of the meal deliciously slow. Something that is going out of fashion in today’s era of the rat-race, and definitely needs a revival.

From dishes exploring the latest food trends and showcasing flavours from coast to coast, employing great local produce and premium global ingredients, the degustation experience at Farmlore is a wonder to behold. The care that goes into the conceptualization and execution of each dish is commendable, put together deftly in true theatrical fashion over two and a half hours, as you relish the irresistible lilt of unhurried, leisurely, gourmet dining.