When we arrived at the Eden Restaurante and Lounge at the Hacienda Na Xamena Hotel, Jesus the restaurant manager kindly let us choose our own table and after some deliberation we selected what we thought was possibly the best view in the restaurant. The hotel is built into the cliffs on the north of the island and the restaurant is arranged over various terraces all with outstanding views across the hotel terrace towards the sea and the setting sun. This has to be one of the most outstanding and panoramic views on the island. The restaurant itself has the quality of Indonesian or Balinese architecture with wooden carved beams holding up bamboo screens, and the place is decorated with pink oriental flowers and palm trees. As the sun sunk into the sea and the cool breeze calmed the heat of the day; the low lighting and turquoise glow from the pools below transformed the restaurant and hotel into an idyllic little escape above the cliffs, a place that one would never want to leave.
Once we had settled in, Thomas our very friendly Parisian waiter introduced himself and took us through the menu. For the starters both Cheeky and I chose from’ The Raw Selection’. Cheeky went for the Carpaccio of lobster, alga nory weed, soy sauce, green mango with crispy seaweed which looked like a work of art and tasted exquisite whilst I went for my ‘go-to-test-dish’ the tartar of ox ‘cut with knif’ which was simple yet delicious. We selected a bottle of wine called ‘Menade’ that was an organic and biodynamic wine made from Sauvignon blanc grapes from northern Spain. It was almost too easy to drink and complimented the food perfectly.When it came to the main course we both could not resist the salt beef with white fish served with sweet potato mash, stuffed courgette, ratatouille and Mediterranean vegetables. It was divine but I could have eaten a second plate all over again. One of the aspects of Eden that I love is that they have their own organic vegetable and herb garden, so a lot of the vegetable and herbs on your plate are freshly picked that day and all other ingredients are sourced from around Ibiza Island. The combination of local and fresh picked produce comes through in the crisp, clean flavours of every course.
It was now time for my favourite part of every meal… dessert! It is almost as if they knew I was coming, because we were each given a special dessert collection plate with five different desserts. The collection consisted of soft chocolate fudge which was creamy and delectable, tangerine foam, frozen yoghurt on meringue and a chocolate orange macaron and a green tea and lemon macaron, all accompanied by a raspberry coulis. This was dessert heaven.Once we reached this part of the evening the table service seemed to wind down a little, so we decided to retire to the lounge area to enjoy espresso martini cocktails and after some convincing we managed to persuade the waiters to serve us more of their delightful macarons with our cocktails.
The Eden Restaurante & Lounge really is located in an idyllic location high up on the cliffs where one finds that the worries of the world pale away into insignificants. The food is divine and leaves one wanting more, so I will have to go back one day and eat it all over again.
Open every day, lunch is served from 1.00pm till 4.00pm and dinner is served from 8.00pm till 11.00pm.
Eden Restaurant & Lounge
Hacienda Na Xamena,
Na Xamena s/n, San Miguel
07815, Ibiza, Spain
