Puzzling as the name sounds, Blue Tan is a spacious, naturally well-lit restaurant in the humongous structure that's now Heritance Negombo.
They offer all-day dining, and their menu is predominantly Western, while also being on the higher end of the spectrum. As in, nearly 1,500 for a dessert end of the spectrum.
Food and Drinks
We went for a Banana Chocolate Smoothie and a Heritance Delight, both priced at Rs. 600.
We preferred the Heritance Delight as it was somewhat lighter and tangier, with a citrus flavour, whereas the Banana and Chocolate smoothie was literally just bananas and chocolates blended unhappily together, making it rather too thick for consumption without the help of a spoon.
Our Forest Mushroom Soup (Rs. 1,150) includes shitaake, abalone, button mushrooms and a 'cream swirl', and was quite fragrant and well flavoured, and had a bit of bread dipped in it. Not exactly a crouton.
We were excited to try out the Thyme Infused Grilled Chicken. The menu said it'd come with a side of potato wedges, chilli garlic kankung, and 'ginger citrus reduction' including poultry, so we were expecting soft, succulent chicken nicely flavoured with thyme and drizzled with ginger and citrus. What we got was a plateful of rather chewy and poultry hidden under a forest of thel-daapu kankung which was the highlight of the dish.
Shelling out Rs 1,450, I was rather disappointed. To be fair it's a generous portion and could be shared among two people. You'd have been able to finish it on your own though, if you weren't trying to palm off the greens and the not-so-succulent meat off to your friend.
Dessert was a Cinnamon Apple Dome, which was also Rs. 1,450.
The chocolate ice-cream with the biscuit was really good. The stewed apples, not sooo much. Intriguingly presented, we were still confused as to what the whole point of this was because it wasn't much, really. We got a slight undertone of cinnamon along with the stewed apples, but the dish was disappointing overall.
Ambience and Service
It's a large restaurant, with a lot of natural lighting and dark furniture. The staff are very friendly, and they didn't hang around unnecessarily, so you have enough privacy for a quiet conversation or to catch up with a few good friends.
Conclusion
Blue Tan is undoubtedly catering to tourists — which would explain the prices — but not the food. When you pay over a thousand bucks per dish you'd expect something really good, and this just sadly fell short.
