Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

It was a lazy Sunday afternoon when I decided to have lunch at the Hotel Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon. For a buffet option I headed off to the MoMo cafe and with my trusty camera in  hand I just went crazy clicking pictures (I clicked more picks than I ate!) Unfortunately my site would die if I upload them all. Even the ones you see here are compressed and cropped so that I don't drive you mad while the page loads.

Anyhow, enough of the banter and lets get straight to a review of the MoMo Cafe.

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

MoMo Cafe is situated on the ground floor of Courtyard by Marriott. The Executive Chef at the hotel is an ‘Ayurveda food’ expert with over 3 years of experience dealing in the same genre as Ananda. The cafe offers a huge array of options during their lunch buffet. 

As you enter you are welcomed by a live band playing soft music and then there is this big arrangement of desserts (I will show you more pictures of this later). As I settled down on a table I was welcomed by the courteous staff. Actually I must mention here that I really liked the fact that right from the entrance of the hotel to my table, everyone said "namaste" (salutation in Hindi) - it just felt very welcoming.

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

 MoMo Cafe offers Chinese, South Indian, North Indian and Continental dishes. There is a live counter where you are served fresh fritters and Sushi. The aroma and the way the counter is set up is super nice. There are fresh cut vegetables which just add so much color. 

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

I clicked a pic of the chef who was making the Sushi - see the colorful and bright cut veggies on the left!

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

The decor is bright red contrasted with black and the use of silver in a lot of places. The crockery is all bright orange. The pans that you see below have really heavy lids but don't worry one of the staff persons will come and hold the lids for you while you dish out your favorite stuff.

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

 My favourite counter was the salad and pasta counter. There were over 10 types of salads and dips. Fresh vegetables and chicken/fish can be grilled for you. Since I am a pure vegetarian I told the chef and he made sure my veggies were grilled on an absolutely clean pan with clean serving spoons. 

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

 The drink to accompany my food was a mint Mojito - very refreshing.

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

And here is my plate with different dips, salads, curd, cheese and some cute little garlic breads. 

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

 I had to share this picture of a freshly grilled prawn - it looked so bright (and my non-vegetarian friend agreed that it tasted just as yummy too!)

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

And once I was done with the appetizers I ordered a pizza that was custom made to my taste. This pizza was much more yummier than this picture can show. The veggies were fresh, the sauce used was extremely tangy with the flavors of sun-dried tomatoes and it was baked in a huge oven that I could see. It reminds you of the way the Italians make their pizza. 

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

 Here's a pic of the lovely lady who was singing live at the cafe.

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

And now - hold your breath - below is a picture of some of the desserts at the dessert counter. There were I think a total of around 30 desserts (if I counted them right) - my favourite was the chocolate cake that you see 2nd on the top row. It had my favorite combo of chocolate and walnuts. Since I went for the lunch around Easter, the dessert counter had this huge chocolate center piece with cute bunnies and Easter eggs made of pure chocolate.

Lunch At Courtyard by Marriott Gurgaon - MoMo Cafe Review

I had a nice time at the MoMo cafe. I enjoyed everything I ate and my friend enjoyed everything non-vegetarian. The Indian food was very good too. I did not try anything from the Chinese or South Indian counters (something for next time!)

The price for the Sunday lunch buffet is Rs 1650 plus taxes (buffet on other days are cheaper).

I was really happy with the over all food variety, quality, taste and presentation. But the best part I must say was the courteous staff. A lot of times during buffet offerings the staff just tends to stand there and is of no help but here the staff made sure all the guests were comfortable and got what they wanted to eat.

Overall I would give the cafe a rating of 8.5/10 - the only reason for deducting the 1.5 points is that a couple of desserts did not meet the 10/10 rating and could be improved a bit - see I have sweet tooth and I expect buffets to offer the best in terms of desserts :)