Au Bon Pain

Au Bon Pain is a great place to hit if you feel a rumbling in your tummy – but not enough for a hearty meal.

The first time I went here, I was so impressed with the self service system and the items on display , this was at the outlet in Mantri Mall. We were so tired after walking around and dropped in for some juice .We also ordered a white forest cake for S's mom who was celebrating her birthday the same day . It was nice and moist .Unfortunately no pics of it.

The next time I went, was in the outlet in the Cradle hospital where I went for a scan while expecting baby A. I just had a croissant that day and it was really soft and buttery, you can make out its freshly baked.

An actual visit was when we were in Koramangala during one of those cooler mornings. Dropped in to have a snack.On entering we see some soups on offer and immediately change our mind .

We tried the oriental chicken soup , which was the nonveg soup of the day , the veg option was potato and leek soup.We decided to get it served in the bread bowl – it was a good decision cos the bread soaked up all the goodness of the soup and tasted so comforting and filling- just perfect when there is a slight nip in the air.

The soup was hot and garlicky with just enough spice in it.We teamed that with a chicken wonderwich .Now I expected 2 pieces of brown /white bread with some chicken filling inside but what came was a roll kinda bread with a chicken patty and some slices of tomato and lettuce inside( almost like a burger). Blame it on my poor observation.It was not that great.
The staff are really helpful and welcoming , and I particularly liked the self service part where you can choose whatever you want with the help of some tongs and little baskets . I highly recommend the soup particularly inside the bread bowl.

Location - Intersection Of 100 Feet Ring Road And 80 Feet Road, Sony Center Signal, Koramangala

Price ( for 2) - Inside 200 Rs

Yum-O-Meter - 3/5

Heera

We visited this place with high expectations for my birthday dinner. First impressions – wow, looks pretty interesting! The walls , curtains, chairs are all blinged up and there are lovely chandeliers all around to give it a sort of Mughal palace feel. There is a big screen in the middle of the dining area playing old Bollywood cabaret songs.

 I liked the way the lights kept changing shades of colour , almost like a disco light. 

Another interesting thing was they had turbans and extensively decorated waistcoats for the diners to try on ,complete with fake swords. 

That was the only good part of the whole experience- had a good laugh with all of us trying them on and posing for pictures. After that, it went completely downhill.

For starters, we ordered the so called Heera delicacy ‘Lal Mirch ka murgh’ – the description was chicken pieces marinated and cooked with chilly paste and spices in a tandoor. Then we waited.. and waited… and waited.The waiter kept  reassuring us that it would be coming out soon. Finally after 30-40 minutes – seeing our grumpy faces I guess – he came and said it would take more time and whether we want to start with the mains. But we decided to wait for some more time. Finally it came out.

Lal Mirch ka murgh

 One taste and all our faces fell – it was just chinese chilly chicken – with a good amount of cornflour and ajinomoto mixed with some extra chilly powder. And I’ve had better chilly chicken from local places near my house. It was definitely not cooked on a tandoor – we asked the waiter and he said that was the cooking style of this dish , but if so it definitely should not be in the tandoor section. S believes that they just ran out at the last minute and bought chilly chicken from some nearby joint.

For mains, we planned to order a butter chicken and a mutton dish . I say planned because the waiter kindly informed us that none of the mutton items were available as it was over ! That was pretty surprising considering it was only 9pm and the place wasn’t exactly jam-packed even for a Sunday evening. Finally he came back and said that mutton seekh masala was available. So we decided to try that was well.

We also ordered some roomali rotis- which the kind waiter again mentioned is not available –we settled for some plain rotis and lacha parathas.

Again after quite some waiting, the food arrived and we dug into it with gusto – and tasted a mouthful of disappointment. 

Mutton seekh masala ( L) and Butter chicken (R)

 The butter chicken lacked any kind of flavour – I can safely say that it was the worst chicken dish I’ve ever had( including my initial cooking disasters) . The mutton seekh was pretty big in size but lacked any kind of flavour – I guess they just put the leftover seekh kababs into very chinesy gravy – I dunno which part of mughal kingdom the Chinese dishes came from!

The rotis were  good .

By now .we dint want to even attempt any of the desserts and got ready to leave. I think it was pretty obvious we were unhappy as the manager asked us the feedback. He promised me that it would be better in a month’s time but I don’t know if I would have the courage to go back and burn my wallet. S is not convinced and says if they were genuine they would have reduced some part of the really hefty bill.

The food is outrageously priced and below standard. The menu was sticky and had foodmarks on it. And the icing in the cake was the fly in my glass of water. Overall a huge disappointment!

  

Location - 4th floor, Opposite Shoppers Stop,3rd phase, JP Nagar, Bangalore

Price – Around 2000 Rs ( all dishes are around the 300 rs range )

Yum-O-Meter – 1/5 ( just for the laughs provided cos of the dressup and the rotis)

Breakfast @ Taj Falaknuma Palace, Hyderabad!

This is a continuation of our trip to Hyderabad. Since it was in celebration of my parents 30th anniversary , we decided to treat them to a special day and booked a days stay at the Taj Falaknuma Palace, amongst the top most hotels in India, and by the way things are looking , heading towards the top list in the world. It was just a spectacular experience. Get ready to get pampered in style from the moment you arrive - where a horse driven carriage awaits you at the reception, rose petal showers welcome you inside , and once inside your breath is taken away by the wondrous architecture which is a mix of European and Indian. Each and every tile, lamp, clock around  manages to fascinate you by its beauty . I especially loved the lobby with its venetian work , beautiful murals and soft lights.

The lobby

In the evening , you can attend the palace tour by the historian , truly a very interesting tour - his knowledge of the Nizami way of life and times is immense. After which you can relax and listen to some qawwali music on the balcony overlooking Hyderabad city.

Each and every room in this palace is so unique and remarkable, but to mention a few, there was an amazing library with extremley rare books, many first editions ones like the Encyclopedia Brittanica, books by Winston Churchill, a book written by one of the survivors of the titanic. I especially enjoyed thumbing through the earliest Visitors book with entries from British officials.

Library

Every ballroom was lovely with breathtaking chandliers, and the most famous room here is the 101 dining room - named so cos it can seat 101 guests . Its the longest dining table in the world, complete with Versace plates and gold tumblers.

101 Dining room

Truly magnificent and no picture can do justice to its beauty .
We spend the whole day exploring the palace , clicking thousands of pictures and just taking everything in.
Obviously the next morning we were ravenous. Breakfast was an absolute delight , we could choose whatever we wanted from the menu in the Celeste restaurant , and it was made fresh and bought to us.There is a great selection to choose from and ,while you wait they bring you a wide selection of croissants( both white and brown), muffins ,pastries, biscuits,doughnuts and danishes.

This was served with a variety of preserves, honey and fresh juices as well as champagne(!) .
We ordered quite a bit of things and everything was delicious.
Here you can see poached eggs , served on top of toasted muffins, ham and wilted spinach. Really tasty. 

Poached eggs with ham

Where ever we see an english breakfast on the menu , we have to try it , and here it was no disapointemnt with a spread of scrambled eggs done perfectly, chicken sausages, bakes potatoes, toast and grilled tomato.It had a side of baked beans as well .

English Breakfast

For baby A , we ordered the banana pancakes with honey and cream.This was seriously addictive - filled with the richness of bananas and butter. Baby A loved it and so did we.

Banana pancakes

Dad went for the spanish omlette - which is a thick omelette with potatoes and served with some baked beans and toast . He seemed to be enjoying it as he dint even look up while eating it :)

Spanish omelette

Bro tried the orange french toast served with some mascarpone cream - again so buttery and rich and oh so full of calories, but who cares when you are on vacation .

Orange french toast

We also tried sides of ham and pork sausages.

Mom went for indian and tried the upuma , as well as the panner paratha.

Upuma and sambhar

The paratha  was served with a variety of chutneys and tasty with lots of desi ghee but then it was like the ones we get in good north indian restaurants .

Paneer paratha

Now we were totally bursting at the seams after this spread .

Truly a 5 star meal , we all immensely enjoyed the stay as well as the food.Of course, being a Taj property its on the expensive side but I think it was worth every penny. A trip to remember!

Price - Around 1000Rs ( Buffet + included in the stay )
Yum-O-Meter - 5/5

Biriyani Wars- Bawarchi VS Paradise - Hyderabad !

What comes to your mind first , when I say Hyderabad ? Is it the mughal splendor associated with Nizams from long ago , the soulful qawwaalis , the endless trinket shopping in Choodi bazaar or  flavorsome Hyderabadi biriyani . Im sure for most people esp guys ;) it must be the biriyanis this place is famous for.
Last month , we got a chance to visit this beautiful place with family . Almost every person I talked to would mention ' Please dont forget to try the biriyani from Paradise hotel / Bawarchi! ' . So obviously we decided to try both.
First evening we reached , we immediately headed out to locate our first target - Bawarchi  and bought parcels back to the hotel.

Note- they have no other branches

We started off with chicken tikka . Must mention, its packed pretty well, well insulated and the heat is retained for atleast a couple of hours.

Chicken Tikka

The tikka was juicy and succulent , spicy as well. The usual accompaniments of onion rings ,lime wedges and mint chutney just added to the flavours.
Of course the main item was the Mutton biriyani . We had our first taste and reliased why this place was so so popular.

Mutton biriyani - Bawarchi

It was absolutely delicious - The rice long grained and fragrant with the aroma of subtle spices. The meat was so tender ,it was just melting in our mouths . It had the accompaniments of raita and mirchi ka salan, but I preferred it just as it is with nothing to mask that goodness.
We finished our meal with another local delicacy - Qubaani ka meetha - which is a concentrated sweet made of apricots.

Qubaani ka meetha

Now this is a tad tooo sweet for my taste, but S loved it - and Baby A couldn't get enough of it .Needless to say it was a very hearty meal.
Next day, our plan was to hit Paradise Hotel and try the biriyani there for lunch - but after roaming in the burning heat in choodi bazaar, we just decided to take a parcel n head back to the comfortable ac interiors of our hotel :) . We managed to lose our way and it was getting late ,so we settled for takeaway from another place - called Golden Bawarchi. Don't be fooled into thinking this is a branch of the original Bawarchi , if you had noticed before in the plastic bag , they have mentioned they dint have any other branches.

Chicken biriyani - Golden Bawarchi

 But this biriyani ( chicken this time) was to die for - absolutely amazing - in fact, i still drool thinking about that biriyani.And check out the size of that chicken - it was a whole one! Talk about quantity.
Finally at night , we managed to find the Paradise hotel .

We started the meal with some Nan , malai chicken tikka kababs and mutton seekhs.Yum yummy ! All the kababs marinated very well and juicy .

Mutton seekh, Malai chicken tikka and nan

The mutton biriyani here is delicious as well - but more on the spicy side , the rice is just so perfectly coated with the masalas.

Mutton biriyani - Paradise Hotel

 By now we were pretty much bursting at the seams, but just couldnt stop eating .

Overall, Hyderabad is a city meant for foodies, each and everything I've tasted here was awesome,and the quantity is just unbelievable -3 people can easily share one plate of biriyani .Also price wise - its much cheaper than Bangalore, so totally easy on the pocket .
If you ask me, my favorite biriyani was the one i had from Golden Bawarchi :) , mainly cos it was the right kind of spicy for me , but take my word , each of the biriyanis were just unique in flavor and totally worth trying .

Leaving you with some shots of the beautiful city .

Chaarminar

Bustling choodi bazaar

Freshly made Nan sold in choodi bazaar - tastes like pita bread/khubuz

Chaarminar at night - isnt it lovely?

Hussain sagar lake

Qutub Shahi tombs

Golconda fort

Yum-O-Meter - definitely 5/5

Manchester United Restaurant

This place has been on my list to visit when my football crazy brother comes to town. He is a big fan of the Man-U team so he was pretty excited bout checking it out as well. its bang opposite forum mall in Koramanagala so nearly impossible to miss with its bright red neon sign  .

 

 The interiors are pretty cool - blue red lights and Man-U team memorabilia and pictures around.

 

 On one corner there's a big Tv screen with one of the matches playing .

 And on the other corner a live DJ with some nice mixes .

 The bar with the high chairs are to a side and  some comfy lounging couches as well.

Pretty impressive stuff! You can even buy their jerseys and other sports gear directly from there.
The menu is a mix - more of continental with some Indian ,Chinese added to it. The menus are literally a handful as you can see below :)

The food menu

The drinks menu - some of the cocktail have pictorial representation of the quantity of mixes in them- helpful

 We were just in to check out the place, so we just went for a drink each and a starter.
S and bro had the special Ice tea - a mix of vodka along with ice tea and lemon - pretty good , especially if your not in the mood for heavy liquor.

Special Iced Tea

 I had a drink called Glory Glory! It was a mix of vodka, lemon juice, and cranberry juice .

Glory ! Glory!

It was really refreshing - perfect drink for ladies - cos its got a hint of alcohol but not too overwhelming as well.
We ordered a side of beer battered fish fingers and chips .

Beer Battered fish fingers, tartar sauce and fries

The fish fingers were perfect - crispy outer coating and melt in the mouth inside.We loved it - and it was way good quantity for 3 people .The fries were yummy as well . I would have loved to try more stuff but we thought we ll come back with a bigger appetite to do complete justice to the food. It is on the expensive side - so go when there s a really exciting match to watch and with some good company .

Location -1, Kira Layout, Hosur Main Road, Opposite Forum Mall,Koramangala, Bangalore 

Price ( For 3) - 1400 ( Just drinks and starter) 

Yum-O-Meter -  3.5/5

China Pearl

Our go-to for all Chinese has always been Chung wah .We loved the food there, coupled with the low prices , but the last few times I've starting to feel 'Are they losing their touch?'.  Also now its been more than 6 years and we desperately needed to try some new chinese place.Couple of my my friends have been raving about china pearl - one of them who has relocated from Bangalore to Kerala, makes people get parcels from here for her to tuck into at home, and it has been an on going battle between 2 sets of foodie friends- one side believes Chung wah is better and the other side goes for china pearl. So the next time we craved for chinese ,we headed to china pearl instead to see what the fuss was about .

First thing that strikes you when you enter is the interior. Very cliche chinese feng shui stuff all around - complete with the chinese fans and paintings. But it was very pretty and of course we all do love cliches ;) . It was pretty full which is a good indication of the quality of the food.
Menu is very extensive and we had a really hard time choosing.
We started our meal with dragon spring rolls and chicken tom yum soup .

Chicken dragon rolls

The dragon spring roll was crunchy and served with a spicy dip . I preferred their standard chilli dip on the table to the one served with the rolls.

Soya sauce, chilli , vinegar-green chilli seasonings

 The tom-yum soup was clear and spicy with loads of veggies, chicken and ginger - perfect for clearing a blocked nose :D

Chicken Tom Yum soup

Along with the starters we were also served a cold cucumber salad and saucy cabbage salad .Very fresh.

For mains , we tried the chicken autumn rice with szechuan style - it was fried rice loaded with chicken and veggies in a szechuan sauce.

Chicken Autumn Rice

One bite and we enjoyed a mouthful of flavor -spicy, tangy and just yummy .
We also tried the mixed szechuan chowmein which was good too.

Mixed chowmein

Along with it we ordered chicken green dragon - spicy shredded chicken in green dragon sauce.

Chicken Green Dragon

The description sounded interested so we decided to try it , and I'm so glad we did cos it was so amazing - the base of the dragon gravy was spinach ,and the flavor was simply out of this world - spicy but in a nice way.Its a must try .
There were quite a few options for dessert but we were bursting to the seams now so dint order any. The quantity is pretty good- there were 3 of us and we had a tough time finishing our plates .
I want to especially mention the loo which was very spic ,span and clean, very difficult to see that these days !
As for the debate between who wins - Chung wah or china pearl - it still continues - cos I do have a soft spot for Chung wah ( especially the one on Residency road - just the thought of their double cooked pork makes me drool) and I would like to try china pearl a couple more times before deciding ;)

Location- 5th Cross, 6th Block, Koramangala, Bangalore

Price ( for 3) - Rs 1200

Yum-O-Meter- 4/5