Not biryani for a change..

Say Andhra and there was only one option, Hyderabadi Biryani. Yup, the royal rice and meat preparation is synonymous for Andhra and Hyderabad, nourishing the Nizam ,Nizamettes and people who are looking for a complete meal in one dish for centuries, this dish is truly my favourite; as true as my excellant grasp of history.

I will give it a pass this time though....

Friday night , not exactly weekend cause mostly I work weekends too, was another impromptu 'Jashn' . This time ,people of this world, there will be no order of Biryani or pulav or some boring dish for flat 305, gangotri apartments, next to venkateshwara stores, close to K something something petrol bunk, down the slope ( notice the extra 'down' and 'up' dimension in addition to right and left in bangalore ) after the upslope near Canara bank...whew. We would personally go and feast..again.

This time to a glorious Andhra 'restaurant' called Nandini. This over glorified mess...sorry restaurant is locally well known for its Andhra cuisine and its high prices :( Right off Kathriguppe circle in Banashankari 3rd stage, if not for Nandini, you have to come here for the dozen other food joints and cool places here.

For Friday night, the place was quite packed,no waiting though. Beware people looking for an ambience or even a lamp shade, the atmosphere was similar to a railway station, a very clean and delicious smelling railawy station at that. I wish the lights were a bit dimmed down, but I guess people were really into eating the even last grain of rice with the last milligram of the fiesty Andhra curry. The crowd was totally family, households were dining on sumptious rice dishes, great apetities in tow. Although I was a bit full.. the whole atmosphere was very encouraging. Over all the restaurant came off as a very well made up mess hall with long row of tables and seatees for comfortably packing in eating machines. I have always been a fan for functionality over vanity..this place me likes :)

The menu came very swiftly, after a prompted brush of rice from the last meals off our to be seats. Vast would be a nice word for the menu. Very full of descriptions and images, my salivary glands kicked in just looking at the menu.

I yearned to eat meat. Chicken being the usual victim, I did as always, ask the waiter what would be a good chicken gravy dish, chicken chettinad it is; to be shared with Lord Chandu. His tallness Ayush went for a very vegetarian egg curry. And obviously, all of us went for plain rice.

The spice was explosive! I mean I did tell the waiter medium spicy...its ok though I have taken similar hits,cant feel my tongue though. NOT the best place for foreign client lunches or dinners ;unless you want to kill them. Trust me, milligrams will do. Then it is perfecto. The cutlery were some fine fingers of mine, best way to get the right quantity of killer gravy right with the rice and chicken. Best Chicken in a long long long long long time.

Is that it, rice and chicken curry. And plain rice at that too. Hell yeah. Beats a lot of stately meals and fancy food outs in a long long time. Thats the beauty I say. They dont need to serve me anything else . A simple chettinad chicken, correctly tender, well balanced with the spice other than the chilly, the chilly is very very challenging with the intensity. Very unique. The rice is no silent bystander, very fresh, perfect timing out of the cooker and the body very full. Fulfilment.

Desert was something my roomies looked ahead to. I expected the usual faire which was available in much more quantities outside for less than half the ammount. Friday, was the wrong day to have dinner, the waiter says, they dont have desserts, ditto for Saturday and Sunday!! Urge to kill.....rising......

There was nothing much eaten to rate, but still, in keeping with the traditions of this fine blog..

Chicken Chettinad.......Very Very Nice

rice( plain and white ) .....Nice

Terrible Strawberry Ice cream.......Horrible

Bottomline, go to this place its nice.

China Pearl. No shes not my GF..unfortunately :(

China pearl, koramangala:

The occasion was a casual dinner party thrown by my roomie and some common friends. If you might have read my previous blog post, company really matters.

I don’t really fancy fancy places like this one, obviously they are supposed to be good, given that people who were hosting the party had tried or had been reccommended about it. Hence the notch goes higher this time.

My first night time in Koramangala, enjoying the sights and more sights (I was wearing a helmet) of Bangalore, the glam city. Hey this is what I came for. My earliest memories of Bangalore were a place where you could enjoy ‘american’ style food way back when there was none in Bombay and a hi tech, clean and functional city. Seems it still has it!

On a road full of similar joints, China pearl strikes no amazement into you. Enter and the décor is a bit crowded and usual. The staff were crisp ( hey I havent started tasting yet!) and very much in the ‘theme’ ! Not bad. The crowd seemed upmarket, except for us J had a good sprinkling of youngsters although it didn’t seemed like a very hip place (considering the fact that at one point they told us to pipe down, but we had our usual kind of fun). All this points to some serious dining. And. It’s Indian Chinese, not authentic.

We were 11 hungry people all from the same company. 11 different points of view, 10 great companions,7 states represented on a table and for sure 5 different languages spoken in a span of roughly 2.15 hours. I love my country.

So let’s eat.

What? The menu was huge. The sea food section was also well populated, which surprised me. The vegetarians definitely don’t lose out in this restaurant.
Heres what we ate, with an attempt at pro star rating, mind you this rating was done by 3 guys, hence I can say , this rating does good justice. Tabloids, please contact my agent.

Shaolin sticks (veg seekh Chinese style) – * * * * .5
Crispy paneer – * * * *
Momos – * * *
Lung fung soup – * * * .5
Chicken manchow soup – * * .5
Red Dragon chicken – * * *.5
Veg balls in hot garlic sauce – * * * *.5
Veg Chowmein - * * * *
Veg Schezwan fried rice (peas!) - * *
Chilly fish - * * * *
Kum Fa lamb - * * * .5
Chocolate mousse - * * * .5
Sweet lime soda - * * * *

Overall I can give it a * * * *. Lack s a full 5 because it seems a bit on the expensive side.

A meal I shall remember, for the food and the people.

Hey, I just did what many foodie columnists do; impose their judgement on the readers in metrics like numbers and stars. That’s the last thing I want to do.

Go to this place. It’s good.