Food in Chennai !!! Eating, drinking, celebrating

Yo Yo Potato !!!

2012-02-28T01:28:00.000+05:30

Tried the new service called Yo Potato, Colleague ordered last week from 3 diff places in near tnagar and got them all successfully. these were pizza deli , crescent and kababish.

After having just a whey shake for lunch , felt a bit hungry around 4:30. thought of pizza deli , but then opted for subway . only problem with subway is that their promotional offers aren't offered for delivery orders , not matter how big. Checked the Yo potato site and called them up. Spoke to a lady and then someone else who double checked if they brought our orders , if it would be considered a takeaway order so that we could get our subs (chicken ham and aloo patty) for 75 and 65 respectively. Got a confirmation call soon and sms with the items and the total. Orders were delivered on time. NO EXTRA CHARGES at all , which is just beautiful . Just double checked with the guy as to why they were doing this "Social Service" of sorts , but thats a trade secret. Everyone i told about this asked the very same question, Why free !!!.

Anyways came time for dinner and we usually go out around anna nagar or nungambakkam for something or the other. thought of yo potato again ( hence the yo yo in the title ). Asked them if by any remote chaec they deliver from Kabab Corner. They said they did. This was surprising as not a lot of people know about this place. The guy wanted to know where it was , so explained the location and even gave him the number for the place. Even though Kabab Corner is a small place , i still got their number for those emergency orders . Think i might I actually have the number for more restaurants in my phone book than actual friends.

They said the time would be 1 hour which is acceptable as it was two different places and traffic is hell near our office. Got the orders on time , except for olives in a sub we ordered without olives. Again , No extra charges. Asked them if orders from loyola fast food was possible too , they said yes and i was like YES !!! Now if only they could deliver from GRC or TASMAC :)

Caution : Ordering from this place can be addictive and could just make you lazy and put on the pounds !!!

The other bar !!!

2012-02-28T01:08:00.001+05:30

After a weekend of lite drinking and a monday at the gym (totally exhausted) , thought i would try some juice , rather than lunch . Mostly inspired by this http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1227378/.

Wasn't sure about a few ingredients that they use and if they were available in chennai. A friend mentioned that he had good pasta at a new place at shanthi colony. Now this area seems to be the largest open food court in chennai. most of the residential places have been turned either to restaurants or garment shops. Found out the place was Juice lounge . not sure why a juice place would have pasta. Could have anything to do with applewood lounge a few blocks down the road? .

Checked their website over the weekend and thought this would be the ideal place to hit after the gym. Finding the place was a bit hard as they do not have any boards on the roads itself. Its bang opposite N2H in shanthi colony , next to tissot watches .

Place was empty but it looked neat. Found a seat by the window and they are as good as window seats on planes. Best part is , it provides great lighting for pictures.

Went straight for the kill , as i had already seen their menu on their site http://www.juicelounge.in/

Was a bit confused about which whey protein they used , concentrate or isolates . seems they mix all 3 (yeah another one called hydrolytes something) in one shake. Asked them to skip the sugar . Wife went for the aloo tikki burger as she is not a fan of pasta. just went through the menu again to double check if by any chance they had chicken burgers as well. No luck !!! .

http://www.juicelounge.in/Menu/Menu.html

Ordered a cleanser (beetroot , carrot and spinach) for the Mrs , with a little sugar. We asked for the juice/shake in a takeaway container. The burger came and it looked huge and huge vertically , which seemed odd . almost like a mix of a burger and vada pav. Wife liked it , tried a bit and the tikki was crispy , though the bun was not soft. Maybe they could have heated it like pav.

The juice and shake came packed neatly and placed in eco friendly (green) bags. Tried the cleaner at first as it looked yummier and bright even though it had spinach. was good .

Tried the whey shake and this was good too. Even though it had bananas in it , i could taste the other fruits blended well and the best part was it was served with the correct chillness . Was expecting it to be a lot thicker like the juices at just boosters.

Overall neat place to hang out with if you don't drink or or you are not a coffee person or have not found the best cold coffee yet (am still searching) or if you have a hangover (they got something to cure that too). Next time got to try the pasta and the pizza. These small eateries seem to have large pizzas for under Rs.250, which is really tempting. Suggest you try this in the afternoon as you wouldn't have to face the traffic and parking problems.

Piiiiiiiiiiiiizzzaaaaaa Deliiiiiiiiii

2012-02-22T01:01:00.004+05:30

The title of the post is what and how you hear on the other end of the line whenever you call pizza deli. Been ordering pizzas from this place for ages . They used to deliver in eco friendly cycles back then. Recently i've moved from their pizza towards their sandwiches. They were the only place i remember which had half veg and half non-veg pizza, which really help veg+non veg combo couples like me . I have their number on my speed dial so you know how often i buy from there

They have something called the chicken club sandwich . its 1 layer of bbq chicken , 1 layer of chicken tikka and middle layer of egg. all this for around Rs.100 only. Far far better than the ones you get at the regular coffee shops. Some people might think its a bit dry as they don't use a lot of mayo. I enjoy this for lunch post workouts at the gym. Usually each half 2-3 hours apart.

You can also ask them to customise the layers . A layer of veggies in middle layer , cheese and they even serve pork and beef but i have never tried those.

All these years and i only have a proper picture today . The order above included chicken sandwich (2 layers of meat) and veg and chicken club sandwiches .

The piks below shows the 3 layer club with veggies in between.
Hopefully , better pictures will be coming soon.

They have a new service at www.dinein.in , where you can also find their menu : http://www.dinein.in/
https://www.facebook.com/dinein.in

If they could get more raw veggies in a layer and get whole wheat bread , it would be super .

V-Day special : V for veggie this time !!!

2012-02-17T02:04:00.000+05:30

Was getting into the mood for v-day listening to to 50's and 60's english songs (n lovin it) all last week. . As usual left it to the wife to choose the place and as usual i ended up choosing in the end. Was sooooo looking forward to sandy's or chokolade, but thanks to a muscle tear (never skipping gym for long periods again) and last minute upset stomach. Good thing eating too much doesnt cause a stomach tear , or does it ??? Decided to go to Chennai 24 "exclusive" veg restaurant as it was closer to my office and i loved their gulab jamun , when i went there for a kids b'day party a few months back.

Place was almost deserted . only 2 couple when we entered and a family and a group of friends by the time we left .They had some signs of valentines with a poster and a few balloons. Asked them if they had a la carte , but seems they didnt on that day. buffet was Rs.299. a lil buffet won't hurt an upset stomach , especially if its veg right :) .

Sat down on a 4 seater table in between 2 of those huge air conditioning vents they got in most places these days. It just make the food so cold so quickly. we end up asking waiters to set the temperature along with our orders as well .

The items seem less , but these days less seems good. They brought the soups to our table itself. waiter was kind enough to offer a sample of both soups.

Baby Corn Coconut

The coconut one was different and refreshing , the noodle soup was more of hot and sour , without the sour part , but nicely cooked veggies.

Volute

They gave a shot of strawberry milkshake along with the soup itself . Thought this would have been best towards the end.

Started of with the neat looking herbed veggies , some mexican rice , a little dhal with rajma, a veg roll , paneer and a few other salads.

the first veggies was just too good. cooked well , just the right mix of soft and crunchy and some flavouring , which i think was either curd or mayo. this worked well with the mexican rice.

Mexican Rice

the rice itself wasnt spicy but wasnt oily like veg fried rice you get in most places. I didnt like the dhal and rajma as it was too bland.

the veg roll was crispy on the outside , but something inside felt like just plain uncooked batter mixed with potatoes. Next was the best . The paneer was just too good. nice and crispy on the outside. Inside it was two thin slices on paneer with some sorta white paste in between. This was the closest thing i found to non-veg here. This mixed with the rice and the veggies was just awesome.

Surme-E-Paneer

For the second round , went for rice , but then went for the noodles (pasta?) , veggies again and a roti. Not sure where they got such big pieces of noodles from , but it was cooked well and had a good tomato based paste. again this was a great combo with the paneer.

Noodles Primavera

finally tried the roti and since it was in quarters just tried to take a big bite. Nothing happened . thought my jaw muscles tore now. tried again and it was just so damn hard. just left it there. people int he next tale had the same issue as well and complained about it.

Finally the gulab jamun i was looking forward to all night and thank goodness my stomach was still tolerating it all.

The last time i remembered this it was crunchy on the outside and really really soft on the inside . This time i was disappointed as the crunch was there , but it wasnt soft inside. think it had to do with it being directly under the air conditioning and not being heated up like the other dishes.

Asked them if ice cream was part of the buffet, after a confused look , got a scoop of vanilla , except it wasnt vanilla , more like frozen milk . Spoke to the really happy waiter and told him about the roti and gulab jamun. He said he could arrange for hot rotis next time , but we would have to wait , which is reasonable .

Over all a good limited buffet , some might find it a bit pricey , but with veg items getting costly by the day , its better to try a buffet than go for a la carte.

Chicken not so little !!!

2012-02-13T02:04:00.000+05:30

"Just when I thought I was out... they pull me back in."

Just when i started heading back to the gym after a long break, start reading about more proper diets and start eating fruits , dry fruits etc again , new places keep cropping up close to my place and in the end, i give into it.

Wanted to try Zaitoon for a long time at adyar , but because the wife is veg , had the feeling it would be the right place for her. Last time around we ended up at mast kalandar, which wasn't a great dining experience. Zaitoon thankfully has started a new branch at Anna Nagar and seems to have found a great location , with good parking as well. Parking in anna nagar can be hell.
Friend had come over to chennai and wanted to try some new place since last new place i tried Aasife Biryani wasn't satisfying. Options this time for lunch were Singhs at adyar , zaitoon or any other place which served drinks as well. Another friend cancelled out and we skipped the plans and went for dinner itself.

We went in and wasn't sure if they had actually opened the place or not. Asked for some direction and was told to go to the 1st floor. there we were asked if it was buffet , said no , but then asked him what they had for buffet. I have been avoiding buffet as i just cannot eat rice , naan , roti etc like i used to. Plus always bugs me that they add soda in most places to the rice.

Went another floor up (lift wasn't functional :( ) . The place looked like a carpenters workshop on one side. and only a few tables on the other. We asked if there was a buffet today , someone said yes and that we had to wait for 5 mins . Browsed through the menu written below each dish and was all happy to see most of it was non-veg. Decided to go for the buffet. Odd part was it didnt have a lot of mutton and any fish dishes at all. Went a floor below and waited . Seems most of the crowd in the a la carte floor were waiting for the buffet as well. Got called up , still few tables, plus we were confused if it was a private buffet party , due to the lack of tables and one side only having chairs lined up. Got confirmed by a gentleman in yellow spectacles that it was open for all and he arranged for a separate table for both of us which had 4 chairs ?!?.

Started of with their Spl Soup , which tasted a lot like a less spicier version of hot and sour chicken soup and had a bit of tomato flavour.

Veg options are minimum , so veggies please AVOID the buffet . You have options like noodles and rice , but no gravy for your guys .

Was excited to see shawarma in their buffet as well , but oddly enough they didn't have the pickled chilly or other veggies you usually get with it. By the time i finished with my photo session and went in line the shawarma was gone :( !!!

Started with indian breads as i was going to avoid rice at all cost. Parota looked less oily and good , roti was good and skipped the naan. tried a bit of the veg panner dry dish, some chicken , some more chicken and some more n more chicken to my plate.

The options were Chicken kola puri gravy , afghani chicken , kasab dajaj (dajaj is chicken in arabic , if memory is correct) , chicken tikka , which for some reason was not boneless. I hate bones (except the character on the show of the same name) . skipped the mutton gravy and the chicken biryani.

The chicken kola puri gravy was good and almost tasted like homemade gravy . My friend tried the mutton gravy and felt the same and shared a piece of mutton and it was cooked well as well :p . tried the kasab chicken as it looked funny . Think its just hot and spicy chicken breasts stripped down and has a stick shoved through it . (double meaning ).

I had added some hummus (server didn't know if it was hummus and said it was mashed chenna :p ) and something similar to it in white , which i think is mayo, but tasted good. The kasab chicken was excellent and i ended up having 5 of them.

The afghan chicken had good white meat and had that it with the parota and roti , with a dash of hummus. Friend thought it was too bland , but told him that's how arabian food usually is.

The chicken tikka was disappointing. for one thing it didn't have the usual orange colour you see everywhere. secondly i was horrified to see red meat , plus it also had that weird pieces of chicken which are rubbery (cartilage???) . This was cooked a bit more ask i could smell a lot of the coal burnt smell on it. Would have been great if they had boneless white meat for these or even better had a live counter for tikkas alone , which would have made them juicier.

For the second round , went for the shawarma , all the chickens again and just roti. Shawarma was bad as it had more reddish meat and didn't seem to be cooked well and i could get more veggie taste than chicken. Sea shells , greams road still the best for me , even though their anna nagar branch lags behind and tnagar is just plain bad!!!

Finally went for the biryani as i overheard a few muslim lady guests saying the biryani was good.

Tried a bit of biryani , brinjal gravy and chicken gravy. biryani looked weird , they had all pieces on one side and kuska on the other side of the vessel, so i took most of my rice from the side with the pieces . Also noticed a layer of oil at the bottom of the vessel.

The biryani wasnt too hot . but that again is thanks to the new air-conditioning which was running in full flow ( or blow ???) . The rice looked good , but you can make out that it was more like virgin biryani which didnt have any meat in it !!! It was a bit dry , with a lil spice , but found the dreaded tomatoes again . tried it with the brinjal , didnt like it. tried it with the chicken gravy , it was good.

They had mango and water melon juice and vanilla ice cream , while people in another table got chocolate and strawberry served specially for them :(. Just feel fresh lime soda is always a good option after such heavy meals. But your mind tricks you into trying faloodas at haji ali or berry blenders too . Else Digestifs (hey new word) !!! Skipped the ice cream and the fresh fruits . My friend said the fruits were freshly cut and really good. but after having all those NV items , i just couldn't look at fresh fruits. think this is how veggies feel , when they look at non-veg items laid out in front of them.

Not sure if the issues with tables was because they were just starting out. It was really bad to see people sitting on chairs and holding plates in their hands while eating. We had to share our table with another family , who brought their twins along as well . They complained about the a/c and politely asked if it could be reduced , but it wasn't reduced till the end.

They had the automated liquid hand wash dispense which was working fine, but someone unknowingly tried to press it and got water all other the thing and it stopped working.

They these items at their counter below. should probably try them next time.

Doesn't this look like a heart :) .

Weird part was , in all the confusion we were never given a bill or asked to pay . i asked one of the fellows and he asked for me to pay downstairs. They could easily have people just walking outta the place if they don't have a token system for the buffet or something similar. Their inaugural offer was for Rs. 249 and i am expecting it to reach 450 by their first anniversary since its anna nagar.

Overall if you require good amount of protein after a good workout or any other excuse you can think out too eat loads of chicken and not feel too heavy about it , just give this place a try.

and oh yeah, the Digestifs at home :)

As if Biryani !!!

2012-02-08T01:29:00.002+05:30

Universe expands. So do restaurants when they become really popular and lack space.
I vaguely remember seeing a small biryani place while travelling towards the chennai trade centre. Just last week a friend had mentioned that her friends were regular at a place on butt road. saw the advert for Aasife & brothers biryani in the papers , but didnt have enough time to check the address. Thankfully a friend came by and got company (and an excuse) to travel all the way to nanganallur and make stop over while coming back. Surprised to find Asaife was on the airport road itself .

Place seems new and has good parking space, atleast for 2:30 p.m. Got a look at the huge menu , but went straight for the kill . ordered 2 mutton biryani's . Waiter in a mixed language said something that left us puzzled. Asked again and he said no mutton biryani saarrruuu !!! OK , two chicken biryani then. for sides we opted for chicken pepper fry , which was listed under indian curries , so thought it was boneless and semi gravy. was told it was dry .

Went for pepper chicken masala as part of the cure for my two week long cold as well. wanted to try something different like prawns or fish , but i have always had bad experience with seafood at most places , be it quality or quantity . stuck to the basic chicken 65 boneless.

Biryani came soon , was told one was chicken biryani and the other was kuska as they ran out of chick bir as well . what next no brinjal gravy ??? Actually yes , they didnt have that as well !!! Problem with new places in Chennai is that you have a HUGE crowd with HUMONGOUS appetite visiting on the first day itself and they dont even have to offer any thing with a FREE sign !!!

Biryani looked good , especially through the glass windows and the warm chennai afternoon brightness.
We had to split the biryani and i got my favorite white meat chunk !

The rice was long , but it tasted funny a , little too sweet with aginomoto . Friend mentioned it was because of the tomatoes , which there was plenty off. started thinking about all those people complaining everywhere about how chennai biryani was like tomato rice and nothing else. to save the day , mixed some pepper chicken masala . This turned out to be just sweet . not sure what the chef was thinking. the gravy was thick , but had minimal pepper in it .

Dug into the 65 and it was ok , a bit too oily like you get in any road side biryani shops. waiter smiled and was able to get some brinjal gravy from somewhere (don't want to imagine from where).

Skipped the raitha completely as the tomato rice was not satisfying at all. Even thought of opening the bottle of Captain Morgons i had just received and having it right there !!!

Rest room had vim liquid soap instead of handwash , first thought was , they wanted us to clean the plates after the meal !!!

Guess i should let others review a new place first before trying it out but then whats life without any risks !!! . Might give the butt road branch a try , but not in the near future. need to find a better biryani place to satisfy the craving before trying this place or its branches again !!!

An applewood a day ...

2012-02-07T01:52:00.000+05:30

And tried the new place in shanthi colony . It was the either this or papa john's which had me waiting for ages. Going by what usually happens when a new place starts in chennai , knew it would be crowded as hell , if eating non-veg was a sin !!!

Applewood lounge sounded like it had some relation to the wild west but then again this was pizza place , or so i thought.

Entrance was a bit odd as it leads to two restaurants , this and Best Biryani Shop (actual name of the shop) . You enter and you face the kitchen or whatever you call the place you call where they make the pizza and it looked interesting.

Really tempting to just grab it outta here and have it red hot !!!

Place had good seating and well lit. Service was warm and prompt. Menu had a LOT of items, including biryani for some reason . Only thing that was missing was idli n chutney :) . was tempted to go for the biryani combo , but stuck to the pizza after hearing a lot on CFG. Wife went for the paneer some veggie pizza (like i care for veg) . They only have regular and large and i'm guessing its 8 and 12 inches.

Me, i just went for the recommended applewood pizza . its topping was prawns , sausages / salami (any difference???) , mushroom n olives . What i got was unexpected !!!.

Went on my way to do a bit of clicking . The owner (who was a chef in a mumbai it seems) asked me if i wanted to take a closer look at the oven. i loved it . would have loved it more if the lens was fire proof so that i could capture the bubbling pizza being made.

When the first veg was being done , i was having second thoughts and just asked to make mine a large , Royal Stag large !!!

Wife's arrived and it looked different cause i hadn't seen a thin crust pizza before.

After cutting the first slice you could see liquid oozing out. Not sure if it was the tomato sauce . but this made the base soggy and pretty hard to lift with your hands to take a bit.

It however looked great and not too cheesy (more healthy???) .

Mine came and i was shocked . The toppings were places in separate quarters of the pizza. i double checked with the guy if they made it just for me or if thats how they usually do it . seems thats how they make it which is really odd. Wouldnt this be the same as ordering four different small pizzas???

Anyways, started with the prawns .

Checked with the pizza maker , if they cook the meat before hand and not sure if he said yes or no in his language , so i just gave up. Prawns didnt seem pre-cooked and did seem like the frozen variety and tasted that way too. the tomato sauce wasnt all that great and its flavouring was missing something. Plus it didn't seem too thick too. This pizza had a better base and the cheese was just too good.

This is how cheese should be. Took a slice of each as parcel and went home and had it in a slightly different way , just to get to see how it tasted if they had actually spread the toppings evenly all over.
Hence my creation below, pizza burger :p.

Leaning towards pizza !!!

2012-01-19T02:49:00.001+05:30

Pizza !!! that 1 word alone will make everyone go 'Yes' lets order. but then you got to choose the place , the toppings and now even if its online or call them to place the order. then you wait , wait and wait and once its arrived , its either cold or they got your order wrong. usually by the end of it your like ' Never Again' but then this is bound to repeat.

choices made recently were chef express and dominos. Read good reviews on Chef Express on CFG. called the tnagar one. Asked them if they had any half veg , half non-veg pizza and they didnt (pizza deli has this) . the guy gave me an offer i kouldnt refuse . make my regular pizza to a large and i get a medium free !!!. who wont say no to free.

order came on time .

The regular 1 was a paneer pizza for the Mrs.

I got a 4 seasons pizza and the seasons are (drum-roll) chicken , lamb, prawns and forgot the 4th one. A bit disappointed that all NV pizzas don't have any veg toppings at all. always thought NV pizzas would be veg pizzas with onions , olives , tomatoes etc and in addition to these have extra NV toppings

The cheese was disappointing. I think pizza hut has the best cheese i have tasted , so far. Base wasn't crispy though the reheated pieces wer good the next day :) .

Had to go for this as papa johns is still sleeping n not planning to open in chennai anytime soon(been waiting through diwali, christmas , new year ).

Last week , after a lot of shopping settled for some homemade dosa's , but by 10:30 got tempted again for a pizza . plus had a coupon for Rs.100 or dominos .

Checked their site for the number , couldn't find it. so tried the online order. after 4 attempts , got in and placed the orders . But they had another offer over the weekend were u pay 300 for any amount above 400. fine print mentions its the pizza rate alone for 400 . checked most of their medium pizzas , Rs 395 . damn !!! anyways added jalapenos and corn as well (again no veggies for NV pizza :( ) I knew my wife would make me feel guilty for not only having pizza at that time , but not ordering for her . She was right there when i ordered !!! Women !!!

Sat back and thought of watching a movie while i wait first movie shows up 'Exorcist' turned the tv off and just waited in silence. Guy calls up and asks if its the right street . He says the stretch is too dark for him to enter. Guess he too was aware of exorcist playing that night. Turns out all street lights were out that night.

It wasnt that warm , but being a holiday and the traffic diversions in anna nagar , i didn't expect it to be super hot n italian , like her

Coming back to the food...

Ok ok !!! coming back to the food

My order was a deep dish BBQ and corn was added so that my wife can have a slice or two by mutilating it and removing the chicken pieces.

The cheese was good , but not as good as pizza hut. The sauce was really good and loads of it spread .

One odd thing was the seasoning which seems to have been spread across the base. initially i thought the base was so crisp that it was breaking , turns out to be the seasoning. Not sure if this was deliberate or if they make their pizzas this way . I would prefer all my toppings , well, on TOP !!!

The chicken pieces did disappoint. I just cannot help it but compare all chicken pieces i eat everywhere , with the quantity of chicken tikka roll at kabab corner , greams road.

Yet to see a pizza with generous amounts of what ever toppings i add. gives me the same feeling whenever i am short filled at petrol pumps .

Overall it was ok and i would try it again only if i don't have any other choice . Pizza hut still way too expensive , that too just for the cheese !!!

Still have a couple of other places i must try : tuscana , pasta bar venito(been there , haven't had pizza though) , new place in shanthi colony and any other decent place i can find or hear about.

Amaravathi - Really Andhra ???

2012-01-17T02:00:00.001+05:30

You think of andhra and you think hot spicy and sexy and then u think about food too.

No other place to go so headed for amaravathi in anna nagar. took the few diversions to anna nagar and reached the place 30 mins after starting from my place , which in normal times would be 10 mins. Riding was a bit tougher as the temperature quiet low as well.
Was asked to take the elevator and saw a place like someones dining room and just headed back down. seems they had another entrance for via stairs and landed at the correct entrance.

would have preferred Marilyn !!!

For some reason , the whole place was filled with sambrani smoke , not just the light scent of it , but thick traffic smoke smoke . place looked ordinary . took the menu and found only limited andhra dishes , rest were chinese items . ordered the veg biryani and prawn masala and chicken amaravathi , which i was told was not too spicy.

Orders came quick a lil too quick i should say . Biryani was more or less like home made biryani, without a lot of aroma you would expect.

Prawn gravy had around 11 pieces and didnt seem all that fresh and tasty. The gravy however was nice peppery n spicy was told that they use a lot of red chilli. Not sure if red and green chilli are the same thing at different stages of ripeness. I just couldnt understand why they had to serve the gravy in this vessel . If this was a local fast food i can understand but being part of karaikudu group ???

The combo of biryani and prawn gravy was good. i kept thinking about the chilly prawns at new andhra and what magic they use there to prepare their food. added a dash of paruppu podi (english translation anyone???) , which increased the flavouring a bit more and added a lil too much spice for me .

The chicken looked like chicken 65 without the coating of what ever they use. it had the usual curry leaves and had lots of green chilly cut open with the seeds still intact. This was boned (that the right word ???) chicken hence i had to carefully cut out only the white flesh . at first it didn't taste all that great , at second the spice just hit a bit , at third , my eyes started watering. felt like the pieces started burning after it passes through your throat and not while chewing it. by the end of it my eyes were blurred from all that spice and i left dessert alone. The quantity was just about ok as i was the only one eating this. Others would have expected more for that price. While driving back i just could not feel the chillness outside , even though my wife said it was colder than earlier. Thats one way to beat the heat.

If your looking for andhra food and dont want to travel far or cross the TN border , head here else just head for new andhra mess, which may seem a bit cramped , but is worth it.
http://eatwitheyes.blogspot.com/2008/07/kure-for-kold-andhra-style.html

There is another place on L.B road , which i still havent tried , but got to try soon. Know any other good andhra place , let me know !!! I can use some protection against chennai's chilly nights with some chlilli !!!

2 squares and affair

2012-01-09T02:47:00.004+05:30

Weekend , mom in laws b'day , it can only mean 1 thing, VEG Food :(. Anyways , planned to go to the chennai book fair laters , so didnt mind a quick lunch. Options were Chennai 24 and 2 square.

I liked the food at chennai 24 , having been to a b'day party held there. Their gulab jamun was just too good. almost crispy outside and damn soft inside. settled for 2 square as it was the closest.

Now i have been here plenty of times and each time i enjoy taking piks , eating food which is served late and eat food which tastes very homely.

Called them up and they didn't have a buffet , but had a couple of unlimited thali's . I like thali's and thought this one would be pure north indian style. They don't take reservations as well, which is bad for me as this place is always full on weekends. Their location is always a problem when coming from loyola as they are situated right opp a junction where 2 roads meet.

Got seats in the ground floor , which meant no gr8 piks from 1st floor glass window (wall?). got the menu and just asked the waiter for the thali menu. After a lot of unwanted discussion all 4 people decided to have all 4 unlimited thali's.

They served soup which i love here. Its like not too spicy rasam (here's where the homeliness lies, and some bits of dhal mixed into it. or thats what i thought , wife told me it was tomato soup and i was like Oh.

They served this with juice , why is a mystery i do not want to investigate. it turned out to be sweet lime , which i only associate to days spent in hospital.

Then came the thali and the confusion of who gets what , i ended up with the only north indian thali and others got , chennai (TN?) , malabar. mumbai and hyderabad.

I like thali's for their size and choices and it always reminds me of punjab for some reason , people eating roti off huge plates and having lassi .

This northy version had paneer !!! , dhal !!, veg curry ! and oddly enough , sambar and rasam. They also gave a tiny cup of just plain basmathi rice which i thought was the normal rice , but it was pulav ???

The roti's were good and i finished the paneer dish and the veg curry in record time as it tasted really good and well cooked too. The paneer dish had fresh looking peas but not sure why the paneer dish had potatoes in it though.

The sweet , karam dish was odd as it looked like a brown bhaji within a white bhaji (inception style) .

This time i had the issues . All the other 3 meals had rice , so it was served really quick .

I got just 1 roti and all additional ones were prepared only after i asked for seconds. So i asked for 2 rotis , thinking that would be sufficient for the dishes and ordered another round of the paneer and veggie dish too. Dishes came early with no roti in sight. Tried the pulav and dhal , was good , mixed the sambar , it was amazing. Then came the rotis and another round of paneer , but this time they just gave paneer outta another gravy :( , not peas . So just had another round of rice. Mixed raitha and curd as well with the rice as the curd looked too good. Ice cream was bad , so i placed a separate order for fresh lime soda. It was good , but who the heck serves juice in a plastic tumbler , even if it look fancy. Even small tea shops have good glasses these days.

Anyways , hopefully they can get more people to serve the thali's next time. Price are actually really good. Give it a try , but remember to ask for more rotis and dishes you like (may like) , while you place your order itself.

Headed for the book fair . Other than the usual stalls at the entrance (soups , peanuts , cotton candy etc) , this time the catering was given to a single caterer and no more variety of food stalls from different places.

Men in suits helping out customers and none of the stalls had anything written on them about what dish was served .

Just look and get token system. tried the badam milk (not tasty or sweet enough) , gulab jamun . others had rounds of coffee and bonda which they liked.

Was tempted to try the chinese stall and the dosa , but just didnt look interesting enough i.e. wasn't non-veg.

Equinox - A new year, a new restaurant

2012-01-01T22:18:00.009+05:30

Day and Night are equal

A new year has arrived and a new dilemma , overchoice . Too many new restaurants to try. On the one hand you want to try a new place, on the other , you don't want to be disappointed with the first restaurant you go to in the new year and wouldn't mind going to your favourite places. After an exhaustive search, left with moti mahal , equinox , sigree and amaravathi (anna nagar). Just to be on the safer side , read up a few reviews on burrp.com along with searching on CFG's page on FB. Finally decided on equinox , because the pictures on their FB site looked good.

Easy to find as it was just above raymonds showroom at the entrance of KNK road nungambakkam. wasnt sure about parking so left the car outside. Place was nice and first feeling was of deja vu . I wondered if this was mystic masala , which i had gone to a couple of years back. Turns out they are at the building next to this one.

Was greeted by Mr.Mark , who wished us for the new year and guided us through our orders as well. Going by the CFG reviews , ordered the cereal prawns. it was mentioned as healthy option and images of boiled prawns surrounded by oats , honey and corn flakes popped up in my head.

Mark reassured us that it was a bit spicy so just went for it. He recommended the hunan Chicken as well. Rice or noodles is always an issue for my wife and I. she's semi - vegitarian (has only pop corn chicken from chick punch). so gave her the choice of rice / noodles as i was going to have something dead already on my table. Yong or Yang Chow veg rice was her choice. Was told this is fried rice with sauce(s) on top and you need not order a separate gravy for veg. Less veg on the table is fine with me.

Was admiring the interiors while we waited for the food to make its way. Place had some good seats tucked away with curtains of beads , nice option to bring the whole family. Art work and lighting was excellent. they even had these bottle lamps on few tables which looked lovely.

First came the rice and it looked nice with the sauce dripping from top with a lot of veggies , thankfully cut in small pieces. I just hate having huge chunks of veggies on any dishes which makes me wonder if the chefs are lazy.

One advantage of chinese restaurants is that the waiters serve the food in small portions to each person on the table. Although this time i had to ask him to wait a bit , as i wanted to take a few clicks before he started serving. He didnt mind waiting for me to finish the photo shoot :)

Next was the prawns. oh oh , why was half the plate filled with cut veggies. then realised the portions should be fine , since i was the only sea food muncher on that table. Prawns looked good , medium sized and oddly enough had curry leaves on top. One usually finds these on chicken pepper fry or kadai fry at our speciality south indian NV restaurants. They also had a red chilli sorta thing , but i was damn sure this wasnt red chilli that you usually get in stores. it wasnt capsicum either.

Next was the hunan chicken. nice to see some white chunks of chicken . even better to see them cut into long medium strips. have seen a few chinese restaurants where they are either too thin and made of bad, really bad pieces of white/non-white chicken pieces or either too large and rubbery. read in their menu that all their meat at fresh and they don't use frozen poultry and fish. Good to know after having a bad meal made of frozen suguna chicken at home last week.

Was served a portion of each dish and started my way from the rice and made my way quickly to the prawns and hunan chicken. Wife was impressed with the Yong fried rice as the rice was cooked well and was spicy as well. I initially thought it was the hunan chicken that made me teary eyed , but it was the fried rice. I am a bit sensitive to spice and ended up using all the tissues placed on the table.

The fried rice with its own sauce alone was really good with the finely cut veggies adding a bit of crunch and a lot of flavour.

The prawns lived up to the hype. I love my prawns just like some people love their porn !!! One problem i have with prawns is that they are all served with the tail and i am not sure if people actually eat the tail part as well. Anyways carefully dissected the prawns tailless. It was slightly crunchy and was really good.

The Mrs did try a bit of the chicken , but felt a bit too much of egg either on the chicken or the hunan sauce and skipped it . Hooray , more for me :) . Now before all you women go about saying how rude i am , i did offer , dragon or pop corn chicken they had , and eventually did order another chicken dish for her , which will be followed shortly...

Shortly...

This was called cordon blue , though the name didnt sound interesting , the description of it sure did. Minced chicken, Yes !!! , with Veggies , No !!! and Cheese , Yes Please !!!.

Got something that looked like someone had fried the moon , if it were made of cheese (wonder why they still searching for water on the moon , search for milk !!!). I still break my head with dishes like these , how did they get the pista pieces in the gulab jamun, , how did they get the toys in the kinder egg etc . So did they fry the chicken with the cheese inside or added the cheese later as it was melted as well. It could have a bit more flavouring , lets say ground fresh spices (Oregano???). It did look a bit too dark as well. Not sure if they could make the same a bit more golden brown, anyways its the taste that takes priority !!!

Felt good that gyms are on holiday on new years day and i can burn these calories another day (hopefully tomorrow).

Me, i just started hogging on this like crazy . Wife gave the idea of having this with a sauce . I asked , they gave a garlic sauce , which didnt have excess of garlic flavoring and was just right to make the chicken taste stick. They say you shouldnt play with your food but i had a great time playing around with this and clicking away.

In the mean time , i got to speak to the guy who runs this place who happens to be active on cfg as well . He explained a bit about how they got started and their plans for the future. As usual I did mention that anna nagar is a good place to start another one (it is , the fact that i live close to it doesnt have anything to do with this :p )

Finally after 3 NV dishes , settled for fresh lime soda as the only other chinese option was chinese tea . Wish they had something like Baiju (chinese white wine).

Must say this was a good start to the year and looking forward to going there with a bigger gang of meat eaters to try all the other items on their long menu.

Price is actually really good for the quantity and location. Most restaurants would charge you an arm and a leg for well... a chicken wing and a leg. They also offer good combo dishes for lunch for a good price as well.

Equinox : Equal Parts Good Food and Good Service !!!

Copper Chimney - Shiny metal but a lil rusty

2011-12-11T00:56:00.004+05:30

After a long search to take a family out for a dinner treat , ended up at copper chimney , other option was amaravathi but wasnt sure if the veg items were good . Checked out a few reviews on burrp , which mentioned the dhal maharaja was great here . Had booked reservations around noon for dinner because i thought it wuld be full with it being a weekend. Seems they take reservations only till 8 p.m and after that its first come first serve.

Reached there at around 8:05 , but the other family had a small delay , so asked the hostess if we could wait , she said we could take our seats and wait , no issues . sweet service :) . Place looks spacious and lovely. got good sofa seats and settled in . Menu reminded me of those book binding material we had in skhool. First thing that struck me in the menu was the copper chimney specials , the kabab platter to be exakt .

That was the first order , as they said it would take around 20 mins . It was mentioned in the menu that it serves 4. Once everyone had arrived we went on to order the main course. Soup was skipped so the orders started with veg , veg sheek kabab, dal maharaja and romali roti. they had a live window view (live counter???) of the romali roti (i think) being tossed in the air. Wanted to take pics , but kept it for later.

Ordered a mutton and a chicken dum biriyani . We had specifically asked if they could make the biriyani without saffron as my friend (he who must not be named) . They made a note of that and ensured no saffron would be added. Other orders wer lahori chicken and bharta chicken , both boneless.

The platter arrived and had 4 pieces each of mutton kabab ,chicken kabab , fish tikka (or kabab) and prawns .

Tried it without the green chutney first and just loved them . The chicken kabab was more or less wat you get in other places. Mutton/Lamb was too good and juicy. Fish n prawns had nice masala and seemed fresh.

Then came the biriyani. I expected the pot but not a roti type thingie covering the pot. Always thought the dough was used to cover the sides of the lid to let you know when its cooked.

Started off with mutton and thats wen disaster No.1 struck. My friend could smell the saffron in the dum !!! Called up the waiter and asked him to double check this. he took it away and came back after sometime confirming that it did not have saffron at all . asked them if they had some sorta pre-mixed to cook the biryani , which might account for the saffron , he said no. friend had a lil of the biryani and waited till we started the chicken biryani , which was also supposed to be without saffron. mutton biryani seemed to have more pieces of meat than rice . I am not a fan of mutton , but wont miss it in biriyani. these pieces were really cooked well and good big chunks of it. didn't seem to have the white fat part we usually see in muslim biryani . most of my friends say that the fat adds to the flavour of muslim biriyani !!!. mixed the biriyani with the bartha chicken gravy . Just loved the combo . Bartha was the non - spicy dish and had lovely flavour . Reminded me of those chicken gravy a few airlines used to serve with basmathi rice ages ago.

Had the lahori chicken (is there a place called lahori in india?) next but it didn't seem to compliment the biriyani well. I should have gone for the roti for this one . Only realised a second ago that they didn't have brinjal gravy (salna???) which is usually given for biriyani, how odd. Not a north indian thing i guess. Skipped the curd raitha because of all the veggies floating in it.

Next started with the chicken biriyani and this was good, just had the rice though, but i must say the mutton biriyani was far far better. Unfortunately for my friend, this definitely had something like saffron because he got a bad allergic reaction after having this. Checked with the waiter again , same story as above , no saffron used.

After finishing wat remaining food we could , we skipped dessert as a boy started crying (not "he who must not be named" , but he would have as he missed the main dish).

Spoke to someone incharge and they inturn spoke to the chef and found that it could be something called kewda, which they use to enhance the smell of the biryani. According to them, this does not have saffron in it , but somehow we feel this has caused a similar reaction to saffron for him. Investigation is still on

Anyways overall , food was good. Just watch out for the ingredients if ur allergic to anything. But thats the case for any restaurant. Not sure if all restaurants have an allergy warning , but they shuld have in any case.

D'OH! NUT

2011-09-05T17:23:00.012+05:30

Why me ??? first thoughts when asked to review Donut house at egmore. Those who know me , know i would be the odd one out in a veg restaurant, that too for a brunch review.

Anyways took a shot because i wanted a colourful scenery to test out the new cam. Met a bunch of new people, but old faces, thanks to Chennai food guide on Facebook. (not orkut, i'm still banned there . reason ? uploading too many piks of food :p ) .

Hitting the gym before and after the trip is advisable but optional :) P90x works too

Now this is not the first time i have been to this place. Went there for our anniversary and then later ordered take away of almost all their choices. Even recommended it to a couple of colleagues in office who were not disappointed , except maybe not having the finely dusted sugar coated doughnuts he had in the US.

Donut House : First Class

The place has good interiors and I was a bit worried how they were gonna fit in 15 food hoggers err... bloggers there . But everyone seemed Comfy.

Host gave a good intro on how , why , when he started out the place, which i must say he did take a bit of a risk , trying to compete with all the other local sweet shops and the bakeries who have their own version of doughnuts.

If your watching your weight n sugar intake, you won't feel like just digging in . As usual , i was skouting around for any new items in the menu. Started off with a lot of clicking and then asked for the butterscotch doughtnut as i wanted to try something without chocolate in it, thanks to their alien attack last time around.

First thing you notice is that the toppings are still in a semi liquid state, rather than the brittle state of the other local doughnuts. There is enuf sweet , but not too much that you require a jab of insulin after the first bite.

Second thing you notice is that the doughnuts are really soft. Thought i remember the first time around a couple of them were fluffy.

For the second order i went for a change and asked them if they could make my all time favourite custard filled doughnuts without the chocolate on top. They obliged , that too with a smile. I felt like i owned the place (and wish i did !!!) . I just thought it needed something more and asked for a sprinking of sugar dust. A few moments later , they came out with this splendid lil thing. with a tease of custard filling on top. Unfortunately they may not be able to make the customised donuts all the time. Probably for bigger orders.

This one spent a lot of time posing for the cameras around that at one point someone just yelled out , someone take a bite. I volunteered .

The custard filling here is too good and you can imagine how fluffy the doughnut actually is that it went back to its original thickness.

The doughnuts are made by machines , but the toppings and fillings are added by hand. Seems they are not planning to have this too done by machines. Judgement day has just been postponed , but is inevitble !!!

One good thing is they do not plan to indianize their doughnuts !!!

I just went for a drink and opted for the red coloured one in the demo meal. Was expecting something like rooh afza , but something was amiss. It did however look great for the piks.

My tasting however ended at that as i was not too interested in the sandwiches . However the Mrs liked the sandwich last time around and was surprised to know they had spicy sandwiches this time. Good to know they are trying different kinda food here. Chicken sandwich in the future perhaps ? Well , NO. They are pure vegetarian and dont even have eggs in their ingredients.

The sandwiches though just kept coming . The interesting doughnuts were the italian herbs n spiced doughnut. spicy doughnut !!! hmm first thought murugan idli medu vadai . apparently this was good.

Someone did point out that their chocolates should improve. They mentioned they tried a malaysian brand of chocolate , but was too expensive. Not sure if this was Vochelles , because i love their dark chocolate. Speaking of which they are going to go for dark chocolate because people dont find it sweet enuf !!! Really ???

This place does seem to attract the shutter bugs . Had a fellow with a cam, come up to me n ask if this was a photography club :)

They have a place at egmore .opps ethiraj and at EA and plan to open in anna nagar. Hopefully not in shanthi colony, which is already saturated and has bad parking.

So if you want to have a lite meal or just craving for something sweet , give this place a shot.

Hopefully they will keep surprising you with new creations. You could even surprise your friends by giving them doughnuts to cut on b'days rather than old fashioned cakes !!! .

Mini doughnuts would be an idea !!!

Seeking Sea Food

2009-09-04T01:03:00.006+05:30

Tamil nadu fisheries department had these small places painted in blue, if memory serves right. at teynampet and greenways road turning. After viewing the transformation of the one in teynampet to an akuarium , fish stall and sea food stall , i had to give it a try , but never found the right time and as usual parking was an issue.

From Food

Took a plunge into the deep sea and was quite excited at the treasures of the deep.

Menu listed on a white board made it look very corporate.

From Food

Eating outdoor under an umbrella isn't my idea of a good place, especially having courtyard marriot bang opposite this place but kouldnt resist fish fish and well prawns too if time permitted. First day just started off with fried fish. Now i have never ever had any other local fresh fish other than seer fish (vanjaram) . but this piece for 50 bucks looked long and yummy.

From Food

This tasted really good , that too fresh outta the frying pan. the masala on top seems to be the chicken 65 masala, which added gr8 flavour.

Most of the people here are office goers and most just trying it out for the first time and enjoying themselves.

Keep going here regularly nowadays, mostly the same fried fish , but the fish 65 is good too. The meals and gravy along with it is supposed to be good. but havent tried.

Prawn biriyani was nice and spicy and suffiicient . but the prawns seem to have been added to the biryani rather than cooked with it. anyways gr8 place for sea food lovers on the clock.

Dial B for Burger

2009-07-17T02:38:00.012+05:30

That which we eat a chicken in any other form would taste as yummy!

This is 1 of my fav food of all times.

Starting out with hardees, hungry bunny and the home made versions with dhajaj (chicken in arabic) patty in those plastic frozen packets this has eaten into my life at various stages right into the to the happen'in eatalica , mcchicken and zinger/zinger.

Something as simple as minced meat, lettuce, cheese , onion rings and a bun for fun.

Nothing i mean nothing still beats the hardees i had when i was just a child. Hardly remember the taste, but still yummy till date, even more with padma lakshmi showing us the right moves to eat it.

The earliest i remember having burgers in chennai was at Galloppin Gooseberry and pupil. Neat burger with filling patty, but not so neat mayo, which is hard to eat, especially for guys with moustaches. Got to keep wiping it off my mouche every bite. Then came Eatalica, nice menu with funny names and one of the biggest burgers i had. May be kause i order for the double patty one, with cheese ;) . This was huge and thank god i had it delievered. Love making a mess when eating at home. An odd issue with these burgers is that thy break easily into smaller bits after a bite, like replicators in SG1.

From burger

More recent entries were Zinger burger from KFC, which is not exactly a patty, just a boneless piece of fried chicken, but still a good option.

From Blog

The one at Chit Chat on mount road was the most horrible i had till date. I think those guys got mixed up between burger and vada pav. I'm guessing the cook used to cook masala vadai earlier and switched over.

From Food

Went first day first show to the opening of Mc D in ascendas. Had the small chicken burger and not impact to my waist line. Totally bad. On top of that it looked liked it wasn't fully cooked.

Gave McD another try, koz they apparantly don't sell Chicken McNuggets down south. Doubly horrible as it was two patties of the previous burger.

From Food

Finally out of desperation and getting late to file my tax, order a McChicken from the new place in Anna nagar and my my , was that a neat piece of white juicy burger, which i enjoyed each n every bite, that too file driving and having pepsi/coke, which was half filled with ice kubes. Thanks to the Mrs finishing up my fries, kouldnt taste the McChicken along with fries.

Anyways, finally landed at Chick Punch for their Zinker buger, again this time koz McD was full at 8:00 p.m on a sunday with the queue lined up till the street. Was kursing the McD fellows all the way to Chick Punch. The ladies here all seem to look the same. I think they all from Manipur. Same kase for shansi, flower drum and any other chinese place, which try to look more chinese by highering people from the north east. Anyways was surprised to see a local new face at this place, but was checking out only the menu this time. (may be next time?) .

Wasn't expekting much from the KFC Zinger wanna be, but once i reached home, i was in AWE for two reasons, one the burger was big , AWE is the only position in which the burger kould fit in my mouth.

From Food

After the first bite kame a big smile, the patty was thick and juicy. As seen from the pik below.

Anyways this along with chicken pop was filling till the top for a sunday.

Hunt for a better burger will go one.

PS: Burger man burgers are not for real MEN !!!

The Other Dhaba in Chennai

2009-07-07T04:56:00.009+05:30

First, i thought dhabas only meant punjabi places. Second, i have no idea how i missed this place, even after years of roaming the same stretch of anna nagar.

From Food

Shri Rajasthani dhaba was quiet a surprise in more ways then one. Being a sunday, a traditional day for NV lunch, opted for pure veg after a kuick kall to a kolleague, who is pure veg and pure at heart too.

Thalapakatti meals was on my mind, but had a wife right behind to remind otherwise.

Finding this place was hard. It was easy finding the MCD, thanks to the politikal mimiking flags, kueues of people and 1 huge ronald mcdonald. he should be name rohan mcdonald to indianise him, they skrewed the burgers this way , why not the name?

Placed on a stretch between Prima's bakery (love their kream kones) and adayar anand bhavan, you have to look for the Rajasthani Dhaba board right on top of the building on the left hand side, on your way from roundtana to thirumangalam. There is a Kanchi hotel next to it.

From Food

After this kuest was a bigger challenge, finding the floor and how to get there. No board, signs, arrows showing the way. Thankfully a north indian kouple explained that we gotta go by the lift.

From Food

The place was nice and big with a yellowish hue.

From Food

First thing i noticed was the HUGE plates.

From Food

Only wished this was an NV restaraunt. They had a seperate slate with a kouple of desserts mentioned, outta which kulfi kaught my eye.

Menu was simple. Thali for 80 to 140, with just a kouple of dishes being the difference in each. Took the smaller of the two.

Then kame the plates with onions and kukumbers. Then the side dishes and then the roti. I must say it looked so damn soft, with a skoop of ghee on each piece you would almost want to place your head on it and sleep off. The Chenna masala was good. I always thought the Big chennas tasted better but the small ones were gr8 too.

From Food

I aktually skipped the rice and just stuck to repeated offerings of the roti. Tried the other side dishes like dhal, something yellowish made of kurd and the ladies finger, but skipped these after a single bite each.

To my surprise my better half was getting the better half of the chenna masala. Seems the chenna masala had my fav paneer , but all my servings, didnt have them. Kould the waiter have known of my kholestoral problem and aktually trying to save my life? Maybe he reads my blog?

The Mrs aktually loved the rice and side dish a lot and its aktually hard to find a place where she aktually likes the meals. I on the other hand tried my own mixtures. Chenna masala with kurd and onion and kukumbers. Kurd with the chenna masala masala alone was tasty.

After gobbling 3-4 rounds , i seriously lost kount, was too tempted to try the kulfi and the gulab Jamun. Jamun was not too sweet and soft at the center as well, which i love. Wish it was served a bit hot like in Shree mithai.

From Food

Kulfi was a not too sweet as the ones in Brilliant tutorials and lacked a lil flavour as well.

From Food

Anyway, it was a different experience having a heavy sunday meal with only rotis and no NV. Don't forget the faithful pepsi.

Thalapa kattu katti kutty ?

2009-07-01T01:03:00.003+05:30

After sprouting in all most every street korner, seeing the Original Thalapakatti from Dindugal advt was a soothing site for sour eyes and taste buds. Called'em up immediately and was happy to know they were open till around 11. But from past experience, having bir at night aint a good idea.Was nice to see they had a website, that too with menu listed. No prices though. What were they hiding?

So went out on a surveillance trip to find out the exact location of the placed, this after the disappointment of finding out that mcd still wasnt open. more on that later. Expekting a bright yellow board on the way from fisherman's fare , found the first difference a bright big orange board and not a small shop tucked away in the lane. thankfully the watchmen/guard outside understood tamil and got the take away menu. Bir above 100? well must be the area. kabab kourt not far from there had similar > 100 bir.

After preparing for a week and having min food for lunch, kalled for a sunday evening reservation for 2. They informed me that reservation was not needed. so reached by 7:00, found a parking spot for the bike and went in to hunt for the bir.

From Food

For some reason i like places which lead down to the basement, like rainforest and some bars (which was prior to marriage) .

From Food

Place was full, which was a good sign. Waited for a kouple mins and got our seats, single table with sofa on one side and chair on the other. One thing i hate about these small singles tables is that there isnt room for all the food to be placed on it at once, and being a visual person i like watching all my food before i start gobbling it up.

Was tempted to try the meals but had kome for biryani, by the biryani and to the biryani. ordered the chicken bir, while mrs opted for the veg vareity and paneer tikka.

From Food

Usually i dont take a side dish with bir , but the waiter, who was smartly dressed and spoke well, recommended the chicken varuval as opposed to my chinese chilly chicken. asked boneless , but he said that doesnt kome boneless. was as disappointed as watching an 'A' movie and not have topless. Anyway went with this choice and waited impatiently for the order.

Families went through the menu like the morning paper, seriously discussions were held with wives, kids looking for pepsi and sweets and girls still talking on their mobiles (some things won't change).

Plates kept. Lovely plates which reminded me of fish shaped plates i used to eat in when i was mini version of meself.

Anyways then kame the bir.

From Food

1st surprise, the bowl was white , small and plastic. Was expekting to be server in those big chatti type vessels they serve thalapalkattu birs in. Rice was brown and as told from a friend who went to dindugal recently , rice was small in size. Well no egg meant more rice , only until i dug in and found a huge piece of chicken sunk in the middle.

From Food

Now i know how the titanic felt after hitting the ice burg. thought ok atleast have enuf rice to finish the chicken , but then kame the varuval and two side dishes, 1 a chicken gravy and the other with potato. had to konfirm that the potato one was NV too .

Bir had all the masalas in a little above average quantity. kould see the star shaped masala and kloves. Thank god they didnt have tomatoes in it.

Taste was a lil spicy, adding the chicken gravy made it really tasty. Chicken piece in the bir had good white flesh (am not a racist, just dont like the reddish, blackish flesh) .

From Food

Digging at the chicken varuval proved disappointing. More bones, less flesh. Anyway, what piece i kould salvage tasted good with nice fried masala kovering it well.

Kuantity wasn't enuf at all as i still had a little orphaned pieces of bir chicken and varuval one . Thought of going for the extra kuska, but ended up going solo on them.

From Food

Overall the litest bir meal i have ever had but satisfied. Have to try the meals for lunch soon. And this time i want my chicken topless, i mean boneless.

Wanted some ice kream, so headed straight for Emilio's, which was transformed into some other shop. Was a neat place with amazing ice kream. Anyway settled for Choco Ice Kream at kreamy inn.

From Food

Usually end every heavy meal with a pepsi or lemon soda, but this time had diet pepsi at home which was chilled and hopefully help reduce the kalories.

From Food

Shansi - No See

2008-10-19T01:21:00.006+05:30

This was just one of those days when things never go right.
After a long fight, trying to prove kfc was a good enuf alternative for lunch, showing examples of all the skinny females sitting munching on their bucket full of posies ... i mean pieces , had to settle for a full nutritional meal . somehow ladies stay thin inspite of the bucket.

Having kut down my choices , thanks to alternatives being pizza , biryani and the unthinkable : VEG , my eyes kaught hold of good old shansi way back in the food kourt . so after skouting for a few seats , went right for the kill . Chicken friend rice kombo . anything with the work kombo just has this holy ring to it . guys this is how women feel about SALE and FREE .

Soup Opera !!!

Then kame the ice berg . Soup arrived , but the chicken missed its flight . they guy insisted that the pieces were small . i told him i have enuf dead pieces of chicken to last me remaining reinkarnations i have . after another 10 minutes , the soup kame at last , but the problem now was the kombo food arrived 5 minutes earlier . guess the management were trying to fly high like the airlines and missed their mark , just like the airlines .

Peoples republik of Kombo !!!

Anyway , now i knew the answer to the greatest riddle , which kame first , the chicken or the egg in the soup .
The kombo wasn't too hot but thankfully our government kut the power supply, so the meal did stay warm for much longer time .

In the mean time in the other part of the galaxy, the mrs ordered a veg kombo from i think tandoor express . the paratha was damn good and krispy , but i kouldnt munch further and had to envy the veg koz of my nv.

The unNVious meal was filling and went well with the pepsi , which kould have been part of the kombo .

So next time your hungry , but kan't eat a jumbo meal , just go kombo .

taka a subway to size 34

2008-10-19T00:57:00.005+05:30

well its been ages since i was able to karry myself wearing a proper tucked in shirt. usually the belly gives a real 3d effect on 2d photos, that too without the special glasses . so following the footsteps of some fellow in the US who reduced his pant size from xxxxxl to something konsidered normal by few , i have decided to try out subs at subway.

it as much easier having it for lunch at the tnagar branch , but now have to go all the way to nungambakkam to get a sub , tat too late at night . First of i just love tuna , and its hard to find proper ekonomikal ones in the city . most kans are just too pricy for the kuantity . at the moment twin birds and another brand are good .

so the alternative to making my own is having mine made by , artists as they kall them . if i aint mistaken , artists were supposed to have unique kreations and made art for themselves , but these "FRIENDLY" artists just fix up wat ever you feel like adding and in some kases they go right ahead for the double meat and we gotta pull their hand away real kuick

they have a variety of bread , but i just stick to ol' faithful wheat .
the skoops of tune per sub kould improve. veggies are added to give the krunchy effekt while eating , koz for some reason they don't toast tuna subs . After mentioning no cheese and mayo , koutesy kholestrol , its off to the sauces . i dont know what each sauce tastes like , so just go for the spicy ones and am ready to go .

Best place to eat the sub is at home , koz if you have a mouche like me , you are bound to get the sauce all over it .

subway had the offer of sub of the day along with lays / kookies and softdrinks , but then read somewhere tat softdrinks bad , which i already knew but chose to ignore all these years .

so from tuna , will try to increase the sub intake to other non/less fat food and will try to make it back to a komfy size 34.

The fresko ice kreams /(gelato/yoghurt/any other exotik name) things are tempting with their 94% fat free , but still the 8% fat is a large enuf number for me wife.

Hottest kool drinks

2008-08-15T10:20:00.008+05:30

Lets drink to FREEEDOM !!!!

what next after all that eating ?

The best place to go after a any meal is fruitshop on greams road , which has branches in more roads now , but doesnt want to forget its roots. and thats good .

Be it sitting in the extra chilled ac rooms within the shop , or the stone age porch looking a lot like flintstones or the fav sitting on your kar, parked in the no parking zones and having guys in green and yellow deliver these goodies . Going to the fruitshop is always fun. Its like an alternative for Hot drink drinkers , though there is no shortage of HOT drinkers here too .

Fav here include Freedom , Walnut twist and the plain old grape juice . If you are in for a bit of more solid food , try the coconut or caramel pudding .
Prices haven't changed due to inflation thankfully . Great thing is they are healthy and pure too .
The other place i just love , but seems a long way is the tiny shops in vepery down the road from daily thanthi office . These are a chain of north indian restaurants , which kater to all your snack foods .
The best thing here is the Falooda .

This isnt like the falooda's with layered fruit , ice cream and semiya (wonder what its kalled in english) . This just has rose syrup , jelly , , something like jav arasi (english?) and ice cream . So for non-fruit lovers like me this is just great to gulp after eating all those snacks , which includes the orange drink on top and a kurious lil murukku sandwich :)

For those who aktually break a sweat at spencer plaza due to all that shopping , you can find lime soda shops strategikally placed near the klosest gathering of foodies . The taste and variety of flavouring makes it koooooooooooooooooooooooooooool.

Kure for Kold, Andhra Style

2008-07-26T07:19:00.005+05:30

Whenever i am stuck with a kold , i am always tempted to take hot and sour chicken soup.
But sometimes even that doesnt work.
So the best thing is to hop into the New Andhra Meals . Its almost towards the end of Pondy Bazaar. So after a busy day of shopping in the morning (which usually finishes late in the afternoon), this is an ideal place to kool off and get hot as well .

something just magnificent about eating outta a leaf

Kool off koz their air conditioning actually works but works too well . You would be reminded of the Ice place in abirami as soon as you set foot to the air conditioned floors here . You might think that totally beats the purpose of trying to kure your kold , but the best part is yet to kome .

You are tempted to ask for the menu once your seated , but just a kuick klance around and you see just 2 things . either biriyani or meals .

Only difference between veg and nv meals is that you get extra chicken and fish gravy .

Neat part is they give you loads of rice and the veg items first and a touch of ghee . mixing the chicken gravy with the ghee , just gives this superb taste . The gravy is spicy , but then again , i am a little too sensitive to spice , even a tiny bit of chilly makes me kry .

The chicken and fish gravy does not come with pieces of meat , so its good that you order extra side dish . My fav is the chilly prawn . not only does it look and taste hot, the kuantity they give is gr8 too .

This is how it looks without flash. Glow in the dark food anyone ?

Being pure non-vegitarian , i havent tried the veg side dishes or even the famous podi they have , koz simply there were no instructions on how to eat the podi like spread it on rice , spread it on gravy , dip the chicken in it or kover your hands in the powder before you start your meal .

But from what the wife tells me, their veg meals is spicy and gr8 too. but i might never know koz i just think its adulterous to eat nv and veg in the same leaf .
Remember to take lots of tissues or ur hanky as all that spice and everything nice will surely help klear any blockage in your nose and sinuses .

KFC : Kueen of Fried Chicken

2008-07-09T00:48:00.004+05:30

The look , the smell , the touch , the taste , the feeling .
each step you take from ordering to munching n munching n munching those juicy ex-chicken should be played in slow motion and repeated forever .

who kould have though that those white birds would make your soul fly so high , even though they dont fly high themselves .

KFC koming to chennai was HUGE . prior to that you had your chick king , which was too small , not so tasty and very greasy . your prime roaster , which is supposed to be healthy , but tasteless as well . and even had ur Dhaba fried chicken .

look gold you kan eat !!!
But when KFC hit chennai , everyone wanted a bite of it . Saw even actor naseer bring his whole family in to dine there .
First choice would be the bucket , but odd thing is they dont serve the free bun and coleslaw like they do in other places . its tough just eating chicken pieces alone without something on the side .

If its takeaway , these chickens akkompany anything from bread , buns to veg pulau .
The best part of the chicken is you got so much meat in some of the BIG pieces and i mean just the white meat alone . never had the kourage to eat chicken meat which were reddish or black . even those wobbly ,gummy pieces you find at the end of the chicken legs meaty part .
well you open up a piece and this is what you get

now why kan't they teach us to dissekt this in bio klass

They now offer a zing kong box , which kovers all ur basik needs , chicken piece , burger , fries , chokolate and pepsi .

The fries were ordered without salt

The zing kong was ordered with a lot of love though

(kourtesy taking my wife shopping for 4 hours)

and while you're waiting for them to prepare this , you can kan this young chicken snacker which is tooooo good as well .

Now thats a happy meal !!!

What the french munch 4 lunch (i just had to rhyme it)

2008-07-05T01:15:00.002+05:30

Think french and first think that might pop up in 1s mind is females , kiss and fries.

They should have named this place french love , koz you will just fall in love with it the moment you start to explore the building and the stuff it has in it .

The place looks tiny from the outside , a huge glass between you and the whole baking process . almost looks like those french models and their c thru's .
entering through the side you just kan't keep your eyes away from the kolourful kream on kakes . The variety is plenty with flavours ranging from irish , toffee to our old time favs black forest and a new white forest .They even have an IYERish kake (eggless)

The pieces are HUGE and a similar price , but just too awesome . its not too sweet and just has the right amount of liquid flavouring on top . Kakes are made of almost 3 layers of kream in between .

I knew eating them all on a single meal would koz a tummy akhe , so keeping them kool in the fridge and eating a kouple of spoons per day . having this with wine is just sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet .

Tried a sausage roll kalled kalifornia , but without mustard or any spices it didnt taste good at all . will rekuest the ppl there to update this one .
Laid my eyes on a kouple of their other pastries and fancies , but will try them next time .

The second fav i found here was the tiny buns . almost 13 (bakers dozen ?) for just 24 bucks . now these are so so soft that one bite will aktually kompress the bun to almost a flat slice of cheese and then they just puff back up to normal size . This is so much better than the mcrennet and modern buns we get almost everywhere .

10 points to those who identify the logo in the background

Have to find something to have along with these buns though since burgers would be too big and dipping them in cheese is too fattening .

Dont they look like gold nuggets ?

The third fav is the sandwich from their sandwich station and a reason i loved it koz they had my fav tuna . the best part of the sandwich here is you get a tiny check list with all the different stuffings you kan have and you just tick the ones you want and voila , you get ur very own kustomised sandwich served in a neat basket along with lays .

This is wat u'll end up with if you have a kraving for sweets on a sunday afternoon.

Bon Appétit (even their language sounds sexy)

Really HOT Hotdogs

2008-06-29T15:03:00.002+05:30

Ever wondered why dogs in all those kartoons chase hotdogs ?

Humans chase Hotbabes , so why kan't dogs ?

Watching all those amerikans movies , tv shows were you find them taking a HUGE first bite outta their hotdogs makes you really wanna wish they imported hotdogs , including those kute stalls to chennai .

But think we got something better . Hog dogs had a small stall in spencer's in their third phase .

These sausages kome in medium and large . I think they steam the sausages and buns , which i use as an excuse to get my hands on 1 or 2 of them on every visit to the plaza .

how many kan you eat ??
They kome in diff sauces like amerikan flavours and 1 indian spicy flavour .

Having tried making these from the frozen sausages you find at store doesn't seem all that healthy . I never figured out how to fry them in oil as they just keeping rolling and they got no sides to flip and fry .

with cheese , for all of you who havent taken your master health checkup lately or just aren't bothered about it

without cheese , for all you lean ,mean dieting machines

The best part is there seems to be no oil and they are just so juicy juicy juicy . you wish it was one of those candy where you kan chew forever from willie wonka .

Their sekond stall is at citi center . The odd thing is their sausages seem to have gotten smaller . not sure if this is kaused by inflation as well .

Watching Super Size Me while writing this , so i don't ever want to check the bakground on how they make this , for fear it would be something similar to how they make chicken nuggets

Under the C

2008-06-24T23:08:00.000+05:30

under the c

darling it's better

down where it's leaner

take it from me

up on the shore they eat meat all day

out when you run they slave away

while we devotin

to kompletely eatin
from under the C

( from disney's lil mermaid )

After the Kholesterol and High BP scares, my answer to good alternative source of food was found here .
PS : by food i mean only NV
Fisherman's Fare is just too good and lokated in easy to reach places for me.
I have always wanted to try the one near don bosco school, but majority of me friends , like most in chennai think of only chicken , mutton and the okkasional beef as NV and leave out fish . The building looks kool , kompletely black and all xfile-ish

After reading a lot about the goodness of fish, you are tempted to dive at anything under the c, except ariel and sebastian.

The first thing that strikes you is the pricing.The name says it all : FARE. while most places in chennai have huge prices and lesser kuantity for seafood, the prices and kuantity here was amazing .

Best part is their kombo food options, which had my fav pepsi along with it. who kan refuse fried rice , roti , fried prawns and gravy all in a single meal .

It would have been nice to have had the soup in this as well , but i'm guessing they mite do that later .

The one at anna nagar has great ambience and parking :) .

njoy urself to a piece of the meat now

Think this was sear fish (vanjaram). piece was HUGE

I think this guy just wanted a tan !!!

I kan't think with this in front of me , just gotta eat it !

Prawn Roll , with the chutney (mint?) and onion/kukumber salad

and something to finish