FOOD & BEVERAGE:
Carlisle Bay has 2 main restaurants: Indigo On The Beach and East. Indigo On the Beach is the main restaurant serving breakfast, lunch, and dinner with a mainly western/continental European menu with the odd local/Caribbean specialty dishes. Light food and snacks can be purchased by the pool and the resort features 24 hour in-room dining.
EAST ~
During our stay, East was only open for dinner, Thursday through Monday. Though it is supposedly open 7 days a week. East features the cuisines of Vietnam, Thailand, Japan and India. The entryway to East is very dramatic with heavy, dark wood, hand carved doors from Indonesia which opens to a seductive space featuring dark hardwood floors and low ambient lighting and candles setting the mood. Tables are well spaced apart with comfortable armchairs with vibrant fuscia slip covers for a stunning contrast. The strong points of the menu are their curries, both thai and indian. On the first night, we tried the madras curry and the thai red and greens curry with shrimp and lobster respectively. The thai curries were simply brilliant and tasted just like they do in Bangkok with the perfect balance between spice, sweet, and acidity. The thai beef salad, prawn and green papaya salad and the spring rolls are excellent starters. The pilau rice was tasty and the jasmine rice was served Asian style in a wooden bowl with banana leaves. House-made sorbets and ice creams are their best desserts, especially the vanilla ice cream! The sushi is most definitely not recommended. The fish is cut like a carpaccio and the rice is too wet. The tempura on the other hand was very well executed. Other menu items were good but not stellar. Stick with the curries!!
INDIGO ~
Indigo is an open, fully covered pavilion with its own lounge/bar and is right on the beach with stunning views of the water and surrounding hills. It is a gorgeous place to partake your meals.
Breakfast – all rooms, as I mentioned previously, include a full breakfast, which means you can pretty much order whatever you wish off the menu. They serve a classic English breakfast, minus the baked beans, which is very well executed. The sausage is a little bit dry and the formula is being tweaked by the chef, since the sausage is made locally to the hotels specifications. Antigua must have some of the world’s largest chickens, that lay some of the world’s largest eggs! As a 2 egg scramble looked like 6 eggs as evidence by the scrambled eggs and smoked salmon dish! Most juices are freshly squeezed, but are not necessarily available daily (eg. Pineapple).
The hotel offers tea infusions such as lemongrass and fresh mint which is grown on property and are HIGHLY recommended. Be sure to ask for preserves and jellies, as they serve Sister Glo’s preserves which are made in the village of Swetes, which is close by to the hotel. They are SUBLIME! Especially the orange marmalade which has a brightness of flavor that is unique to Antigua.
Lunch & Dinner – the lunch menu features a couple Caribbean dishes such as the jerk chicken kiev (WONDERFUL!) and the Antiguan roti, also very good. The fried plantains with guacamole and the calamari with curry aioli are also VERY good. If you want to try a little bit of many dishes, they offer 3 different bento boxes ~ vegetarian, European, and Caribbean ~ which is a nice way to sample the menu. At dinnertime, there are more grilled options and nightly specials typically feature Antiguan specialties such as goat curry and local seafood. The execution is more consistent at Indigo, but we did find some issues with certain dishes. Some would be under-seasoned, some over-seasoned… for instance, the meat sauce was too sweet, the risotto was perfectly cooked but lacked the creaminess of a good risotto, and grilled fishes were slightly overcooked. From our experience, these are isolated experiences and could occur at any hotel kitchen or restaurant.
The Chefs at Carlisle Bay are always willing to customize anything on the menu or create something that is not on the menu for you. There is also an option to enjoy private dining on the jetty which is a very romantic experience with candles and a totally customizable menu, served course-by-course under the Caribbean night sky.
Afternoon tea – Afternoon tea is included in all rooms and can be taken anywhere on property. It is not a large affair, but a perfect mid-day snack consisting of a pot of tea of your choice and 3 bite sized nibbles (2 savory and 1 sweet) that change daily. For example, on one day we had a miniature Jamaican patty, cucumber sandwich, and a mini scone. The earl grey tea is very British, tasting just like it does in London, but again the highlights are the lemongrass and fresh mint infusions.