How to pique our interest? Put wine front and centre

At noon last Sunday, Pique was empty. By 2:30 pm, every seat was taken. Downstairs and upstairs, the room was filled with people of different ages: people with reservations, curious passersby, and those who had been before. For a place that has only been open a couple of weeks, it was heartening to watch it pick up around us.

Pique is a new wine bar off Horniman Circle in Rajabahadur Mansion, and another sign of life in a lovely old cultural district that is becoming exciting again. (Boujee is two doors down, with Irish House opening in between soon.) Pique’s long, narrow, warmly lit, double-height room with wooden beams overhead and a glass front immediately feels easy to be in. The tables near the entrance face Bombay Samachar Marg and the Art Deco beauty of Sir Vithaldas Chambers right opposite, with excellent opportunities for people-watching. Deeper inside, the room gets darker and cosier, with a gleaming bar at the back. Upstairs, beyond a wine-cork-lined staircase, is a loft space with quirky frames, photographs, a vintage mirror, potted plants, lampshades, and wooden parquet flooring. It’s all old Bombay charm with new Mumbai energy.

There is no grand board declaring Pique as a wine bar, just a little round blade sign with a line drawing of a glass being poured. Instead, the two-page wine menu of Indian and international labels, and a daily specials blackboard, do the talking, with a little help from the staff. Each wine is described in the book in a few words: ‘dark, juicy, and velvety’ for a Montepulciano, ‘savoury and complex, hints of raw pear’ for an orange wine.

Founder Sasha Goenka, a Le Cordon Bleu Paris graduate and holder of a WSET Level 3 certification, has deliberately kept the list short, interesting, and accessible. Pique is inspired by the everyday, unsolemn places across Europe where groups gather over wine and easy food. There is something here for different palates, price points, and levels of knowledge, plus an off-menu premium list for people who want to go deeper. (There are currently around 12 wines by the glass and 24 by the bottle, with the selection updated monthly. Bottles run from ₹4,500 to ₹10,000.)

A short discussion with our server led me to the Pesquie Edition 1912M, a Ventoux blend described as ‘mineral and crisp with blossomy citrus’. The team member called it one of the freshest, cleanest bottles they have. Yep, accurate. It is the sort of wine that someone very new to wine would find tasty, while someone looking for this specific style would appreciate it as well. There are cocktails too. My plus-one, a martini fan, declared the Wicked Martini, with dill pickle, capers, and basil, exquisite. The olive oil wash gave it body, the temperature was right when it arrived, and the smoked olives brought briny aroma rather than a blunt salt hit.

I have been off picantes for a while after the glut of chaat-like drinks on menus lately. So, I ordered Pique’s Pizza-cante as a challenge. With tequila, marinara water, lemon, jalapeno, basil, and Chenin Blanc, it was savoury and umami-forward rather than chatpata, kothmir-laden or aggressively sweet-and-sour. The marinara came through clearly.

The food has a matching playful spirit. Consulting chef Aditya Raghavan brings his physicist’s nerdiness to the kitchen, evident in the bread programme and the local cheese board (he’s also a cheesemaker). Pique’s bread basket comes with a little pot of caramelly browned butter, which adds nuttiness and body. I would happily buy a jar of that.

The creamy Spanish omelette is made for a Sunday brunch: golden on the outside, creamy on the inside, with thin slices of soft potato and onion, bravas sauce on the side for brightness. (There are more egg specials on the weekends.) Pique’s chicken Caesar salad pizzette sounds odd, comes highly recommended, and works. However, the leaves could be torn a little smaller rather than left to trail off on every slice. It was more fun than the sweeter Provençal one with caramelised onions, just as the grilled halloumi and fig sandwich was more balanced than the French onion grilled cheese, where the cheese could be more and meltier.

Pique has a dish named Faux Gras, a mushroom-and-cashew mousse with a thin layer of compote. I tend to want a bigger mushroom flavour in mushroom pate, though I can see why it is doing well. The cacio e pere, however, is one I would return for. It’s Goenka’s idea, according to Raghavan, to take cacio e pepe and add pear. Those silky slivers of sweetness are a fantastic contrast to the bite of the rigatoni, pepper, and Parmesan. It sounds playful on paper and is even better on the plate.

Dessert, specifically the Parmesan cheesecake with sourdough crumb and red wine reduction, is for people who want their dessert grown-up: savoury, creamy, with a good body and a distinctly cheesy character. Some of the dishes and a few proportions could use further Pique tweaks. But I visited twice, two weeks apart, and the second visit already felt better than the first. By the time I left last Sunday, the room I’d entered at noon had filled completely, the kitchen was slammed, and servers were striding around the room with glasses and plates. That’s the thing about Pique: it is quickly finding its shape, but it has already found its people.

Address: 24A, Rajabahadur Mansion, Mumbai Samachar Marg, Horniman Circle, Kala Ghoda, Fort, Mumbai 

Timing: Daily noon to midnight

Price: ₹4,000 approx for two with a drink each

Reservations: Call +91 99872 22222