Alfred Portale oversees the dinner-only Gotham Steak. Choose his Florida heirloom tomato salad, with feta, red onion and white balsamic vinaigrette, and Florida grouper with quinoa, haricots verts, picholine olive, speck ham and cherry tomatoes (or succumb to temptation, for a fabulous hardwood-grilled Portale steak, and one of the 13,000 bottles in the two-floor glass wine tower).

Weekend buffet dinners at the indoor-outdoor Café Arabesque, overlooking Dubai Creek and the marina, are a perfect introduction to Middle East cuisine. Jordanian chef Hani Alfarran offers over 40 cold and hot mezze items, including hommus, kibbeh, shwarmah and tabouleh and just-baked Saj bread. Try spit-roasted whole lamb ouzi, and such desserts as knefe, or rice pudding with rose water.

Restaurant 1911, overseen by chef Jan Seibold, serves Old Delhi food. Try Kairi paneer tikka, cottage cheese and raw mango cooked in a clay oven; Bhuna gosht lamb with whole spices, onion and tomato gravy; Dal Imperial, overnight-cooked black lentil with butter and cream. Dine inside, in elegance evoking the old Raj, or, year-round, outside overlooking the city center hotel's peaceful gardens.