The beauty of life, as well as the avoidance of a monotonous lifestyle, for us at least, is party due to the varied nature of our outings. We tend to enjoy anything from a wild and wonderful party to a book launch, as was the case in Mdina, this evening in particular.

So following the launch in Mdina of the lovely, illustrated Nature Guide Series Wild Flowers of the Maltese Islands, by Edwin Lanfranco and Guido Bonett, we proceeded to dinner in Rabat. We were in the more than splendid company of Yvette Farrugia Degiorgio and Jeremy Lanfranco, whose common surname with the author was no coincidence.

We have been trying to get into l’Agape literally for years. But being very much the sort who tend to confirm everything at the last minute, which allows us total freedom to change plans until the very last moment, each time we tried either on the day or even a day or two before, this restaurant was always fully booked.

So this time I made it a point for once to book more than a week in advance. The establishment is very small and it enjoys such an excellent reputation that it is simply always full. So the only way you will manage to have a meal there, will be by doing the same thing as us and booking many days in advance.

When I write these reviews I often find my own self a bit irksome and even annoying, that there virtually always seems to be something wrong. If it’s not the food it’s the service, or something went wrong with the bill, or one of the personnel at the restaurant behaved badly, or something or another seems to make that virtually perfect outing so elusive. But alas, in reality this is very much the case, and if I ever do tend to pull it slightly in any direction when recounting our culinary adventures, then it would certainly be towards toning down a situation which was actually worse than described.

But here finally is that very rare jewel of an evening which was simply devoid of any noticeable negatives and which somehow managed to tick all those boxes with a sigh of massive relief, proving once and for all that the perfect evening can exist.

I would not say that this was the very best food I have ever eaten in my entire life. Or that the service was the most spectacular and ceremonious I have ever encountered. Nor that the ambiance was so stunning that we were in picture-postcard paradise. No, but this is not the point. The point is that all aspects of this outing simply left nothing to be desired and proved to be more than worth our persistent efforts to finally try it out.

L’Agape is tucked away in a tiny square close to St. Pauls Church, right in the centre of Rabat. It is housed within a tastefully converted, small house of character, and although it is nothing particularly grandiose, it is certainly pretty, stylish and pleasing to the eye.

The place is run by two partners, Pierre Calleja and Chris Gherxi, Pierre running front of house and Chris the kitchen. However, as Pierre was away, it was Chris who looked after us throughout this most enjoyable of evenings, as he was positioned on the floor along with his customers. This already on its own, puts you on an entirely different dining level, to placing an order blindly with an uncaring server, in a hit and miss fashion, as is unfortunately the case in so many restaurants.

But in this particular case, not only was Chris’s knowledge most obviously infallible, but perhaps even more importantly, he showed absolutely no signs of self-importance or ill placed pride and never did he take on a condescending tone. For in spite of the distasteful nature of these traits, they can be very commonly found, especially with individuals whose establishment is chock-a-block virtually every day of the year.

So we very simply put ourselves in the very capable hands of Chris, who started by suggesting our wines, from what may be very easily considered as the best wine list I have encountered for many meals. It was excellently presented and was also illustrated, showing photos, amongst others, of every single wine label in stock. Now how’s that for a superb idea. Moreover, it contained a great choice of wines from all over the world. As I even remarked to Chris, this was a giant breath of fresh air, as following a strong trend to develop impressive wine lists only a few years ago, I now find that as an overall observation at least, that of late the general trend seems to be to offer a very small and disappointing choice of wines in so many restaurants.

Chris rightly encouraged us to try some of their own importation, consisting of a line of Piedmontese reds, produced by Fattoria San Guiliano. We started with the III Millennio (terzo millennio) 2013, which is a blend of Barbera and Nebbiolo, with a very limited production of only 3,000 bottles, of which we got number 0292. It proved to be a delicate, fragrant, fruity, cherry and rose flavoured medium bodied wine, with perhaps just a tinge of unnecessary acidity. It was nice however to start off with a wine which was not so full and heavy, as we normally tend to do.

My wife Maria who is going through a white wine phase in her life, requested a Castillo de Molina sauvignon blanc. I love this Chilean house and particularly find that their chardonnay riserva is a great wine, however in it’s absence she went for the sauvignon blanc, which is also a lovely, fresh, crisp, yet delicate and interesting wine. As she was the only one on white, Chris asked her whether she simply required one glass, however my instinctive burst of laughter and her stern yet deliciously charming accented reply “oh noo noo the whowle bwootle”, immediately expedited him in search of the closest bottle he could desperately find.

As we wanted to sample a different red, the second bottle we tried was a Langhe Nebbiolo by the same producer. Langhe being the prestigious area in Piemonte which produces great foods and wines, and nebbiolo of course being one of the most noble of Italian grapes which also produces great wines such as Barolo and Barbaresco. This was much more robust and full bodied than the first and accompanied our main courses perfectly well.

The menu at l’Agape consists very simply of a portable blackboard which is placed on your table, the contents of which change constantly depending on produce and preferences. There is therefore no fixed menu and you get the best of the moment. It is a very limited menu with half a dozen starters and the same amount of mains. This for me is a very clear sign of having their priorities in the right order. Quality not quantity as far as food is concerned. When over and above this the ratio of wines to food dishes reaches great heights, and here it must have been in the region of 10 to 1, I am in pure gastronomic heaven. My worst nightmare on the other hand, would be to encounter a menu with say a hundred items and a choice of two wines – red or white!

Upon our strongly expressed desire, Chris took matters in hand and prepared for us a lovely medley of starters to share. This included baby squid in a lovely, super tasty tomato based sauce. Mozzarella wrapped in Parma ham, lovely salty, smokey and tangy pork sausages form Catania, spicy beef meatballs and parmigiana di melanzane. All were delicious and scoffed down before you could say Il meglio della cucina italiana.

For mains, as this is very much a meat based restaurant, two of us had rib eyes, one had a veal chop and I had a beef tagliata. All were splendid, tasty, of excellent quality and perfectly prepared. All except mine. And if there were any shade of a doubt about Chris’s perfectly accommodating nature and great ability to deal with whatever comes his way in a mature and clever manner, then this would have certainly stamped out any such lingering uncertainty.

We are great fans of rare and more so blue prepared meat. We do however more than understand that certain cuts which contain considerable marbling require a bit more cooking to break down those fats. I did however make it a point to Chris, perhaps a bit too persistently, how I dislike overcooked meat, especially in view of chefs’ normal reluctance to serve you food the way you like it. But sure enough this was not the case here, and while all other dishes were cooked exactly to everyone’s delight, mine came a bit underdone for this particular cut, leaving it chewy and slightly sinewy. But this was exactly how I ordered it, so it only proves how attentive and compliant they are to their clients’ requests.

I have absolutely no problem whatsoever to admit a mistake and to show that I was wrong, especially as this is an extremely rare event… I was reacting to experiences in many other restaurants where you have to super exaggerate anything to try and get it roughly right. So I asked Chris if it could be cooked a bit longer, which again was absolutely no problem and he whisked it away only to return moments later with a perfectly cooked tagliata which was again tagliata in half to speed things up, if you see what I mean. There were no unnecessary ceremonies and childish I-told-you-so’s, just friendly and efficient service all round.

The portions too were extremely generous, much to Jeremy’s hoovering skills. I simply love red meat on a rare occasion, but I must admit that much as I enjoy it, I tend to get full with literally one or two tiny bites. Jeremy on the other hand, polished off everyone else’s, making us sit on our hands and tuck our precious fingers as far away from his ravenous mouth as possible.

One of our usual good meal indicators, is whether we take desserts or not. When things haven’t turned out exactly as we would have desired, we tend to skip these and to hasten the end of our meal. On the other hand, when everything is so delicious and delightful, we simply don’t want the meal to end.

Yet again we were treated to an extraordinary variety to share, this time made up of home made imqaret (deep fried date cakes) which were simply to die for, a lovely apple crumble sided with ice cream and a beautiful elegant tiramisu. All were scrumptious and not too heavy on the sugar, although I certainly won’t be checking out my sugar level this morning, damn diabetes…

Even the coffees were really lovely as were the various after-dinner drinks we also indulged in. And just to continue slamming it home, what a great place this is, both types of beverages were offered to us on the house!

Incredulously the bill came to just under €50 a head with the three bottles of wine and three courses each which also included very fine cuts of beef. Totally astounding overall and most definitely placing l’Agape up there with the very best.

The tables too are very large making for a very comfortable meal, and even the chairs were purposely selected for sheer comfort. Now how’s that for attention to detail and the opposite of greediness, especially in such a small restaurant crying out for more covers, rather than such spacious tables for the very few lucky ones who made it in.

I am definitely not surprised this place is always fully booked and it certainly won’t be long before we return again.