All posts filed under: Multi-Cuisine

Breakfast and Gossip @ Church Street Social

Published by

I hate having to get up at unearthly hours on a weekend (10 AM of course) to catch breakfast at a decent joint. Church Street Social serves Breakfast throughout the day. That’s reason enough for me to like them. I also like their industrial design, quirky prints, funky trays and fun drinks, but we’re not focusing on that today. We are paying homage to bacon and sausages and pancakes and eggs and French toast and sugar and spice and everything nice. Just like God intended. Word. They don’t have valet parking in the morning, but they also don’t have the mad crowds that throng this place every hour of the day post 12 PM. So you win some and you lose some. Shimmy in and you have a variety of seating options. I always like the big tables next to the windows, although if it’s just two of you, the leather couches are way more comfortable. The menu is a newspaper style roll shoved casually in a box made of wooden rulers with a toilet …

Poush – Kashmiri Pundit Cuisine @ Cubbon Pavillion

Published by

You would be hard pressed to find Kashmiri Food in a restaurant in Bangalore. The last time I relished Kashmiri Food was at a special Wazwan arranged by Bangalore Foodies Group and that was well over a year ago. A wazwan is a great way to experience the cuisine of Kashmiri Muslims – it constitutes a royal banquet of over 30-40 dishes shared family style between groups of people.  Most Kashmiri Food Festivals dish out the Wazwan style meal and the Gushtaba (velvety meatballs in a yogurt gravy) is its crowning glory. But the Cubbon Pavilion decided to showcase the less populist but equally exquisite cuisine of the Kashmiri Pundits. While both the cuisines share a lot of similarities (same ingredients and style of cooking) – the Kashmiri Pundit cuisine is unique in the fact that they do not use onion and garlic in their dishes. The tomato is also an oddity here and they resort to yoghurt based dishes to provide the same tangy taste. The most interesting aspect for me was that even …

I’m seeing double @ Monkey Bar (Indiranagar, Bangalore)

Published by

I’m always wary of part two’s, especially if I am dearly in love with part one. Will it live up to its predecessor? Will it continue to hold my attention? Will it be same-same but also different? Sigh…the suspense can wreak havoc with my system. Who’s not worried about Ben Affleck reprising Cristian Bale’s role as the Dark Knight?? (Oh wait, we’re not having that conversation). Let’s rewind to ‘the suspense can wreak havoc with my system’ and apply the feeling to the opening of the new Monkey Bar in Indiranagar. Overreacting? Hell no! Let’s get down to business shall we… monkey business! I went for their launch party where they gave us hard hats with the Monkey Bar logo on it *clap clap*. Then I went again and again and again, till finally, after a month of its opening, I can find my bearings and be objective about it. I’ve heard people gushing that ‘two’s better than one’ and ‘more the merrier’ but unless you’re in a fantasy playing in your own head with …

Mango Mania @ Grand Mercure (Koramangala, Bangalore)

Published by

It’s very hard to keep me away from Mangoes. Considering they make their hallowed appearance once a year and all the good ones are always exported – I always give them A-one priority on my list. So when Grand Mercure announced a Mango Festival (on till the 17th of May), where everything from drinks, appetizers, main course and dessert will be mango based, I was hard pressed to say yes. Considering the hotel is practically in my backyard, I even accepted a weekday invite. Anything for good mangoes I tell you! A table under the stars was arranged for us (complete with organic mosquito repellent) and the blogger group got to work immediately. (By that I mean running around to find seats with the best lighting!). Drinks were ordered and we waited in anticipation of our first experience of the mango menu. I ordered a Mango and Apricot Mojito and was pretty sure I made the best possible choice. The other options included a mango, rum and vanilla ice cream combo and the ever popular …

FoodLovers Gourmet City – Le Jardin @ The Oberoi (Bangalore)

Published by

Bangalore has been a glutton for restaurant showcases in the past couple of years and every gourmand worth his salt, bookmarks this time to explore and indulge. Le Jardin at The Oberoi played host to us this Thursday to kick start the FoodLovers Gourmet City event. With 20 of the finest restaurants in Bangalore participating this year, it promises to be a celebration of all things food. While value for money has always been the driving theme for restaurant showcases, FoodLovers Gourmet city combines that with a specially curated menu featuring the chef’s signature dishes. Add to that the variety of cuisines on offer, options to dine out at lunch or dinner, choices between a 2 course and a 3 course menu – and you have yourself an event that’s bound to stand out from the crowd. FoodLovers takes it a couple of notches higher and ends the showcase with FoodLovers Chefs for Charity. The 20 participating restaurants offer a gourmet grazing experience over lunch on 29th March, at The Ritz-Carlton, Bangalore.  All proceeds from …

Feeling Blue – News Cafe (Indiranagar, Bangalore)

Published by

News Café is like the poor cousin of Smoke House Deli. They opened pretty much the same time on 100 ft road in Indiranagar and both have a similar cafe/ all day dining format. SHD created quite a buzz in the Bangalore food scene, whereas News café failed to garner anything newsworthy. The reason we ventured there was also because of SHD – they were full one Saturday afternoon and could not accommodate us. We were hungry and had already parked our car close by and it seemed like too much of an effort to drive again. So we walked next door to News Café and zoomed up the elevator to the terrace. (Seems like the trend in Bangalore to have restaurants and café’s on the terrace – is the rent cheaper?) News Café is a South African chain of restaurants and boasts of having 50 outlets with two in Bengaluru and Hyderabad. (Concentrating on the IT hubs, are we?). Their website claims that they have won the ‘Best Cocktail Bar’ 11 years in a …

Sunday Brunch @ M Cafe (Bengaluru Mariott Hotel Whitefield)

Published by

The FoodPorn Diaries dictionary (yes, it exists…if only in my mind!) defines ‘Brunch’ as nothing but copious amounts of Booze + Lunch, generally consumed on a Sunday, to arm yourself for the travesty of work on a Monday. Since most of us run the corporate rat race during the week, (which gives us just enough time to drag ourselves to bed every night), what better way to spend a weekend afternoon than by overcompensating? I generally don’t bother reviewing brunches because, let’s face it – everyone has the same offerings. Indian, Chinese and European cuisine served with loads of alcohol and bubbly, edging you to consume in one afternoon what you probably should be eating over a span of a week! But since so many of us are in the quest for the holy grail of Sunday Brunches, I decided to take a dive and do it for you. Starting with the brunch at M Café in the Mariott, Whitefield. I am forced to look at the Mariott everyday because my work desk faces the large window that …

Togarashi and The Bento Box @ Monsoon (The Park, Bangalore)

Published by

Japanese cuisine is so varied that to even fit the basics into one post would be a gargantuan task. So I will restrict myself to what I tried as part of the new Bento Box introduced by Monsoon at The Park Bangalore. The Bento Box is ahem…a box (sheepish grin), that holds a single portion meal of rice, cooked fish or meat along with pickled vegetables. It is the Japanese version of our lunch dabbas, albeit carefully prepared and presented (as is with everything Japanese)! The Japanese have created an art form, even with something as simple as a lunch box. Bento’s can range from the simple arrangement of food to the more complex ‘Kyraben’ where the items are arranged to look like popular Japanese cartoon figures or ‘Oekakiben’ where the food is arranged to form a picture. The Bento boxes itself can range from beautiful black lacquered boxes, shiny metal boxes to the more modest and convenient disposable microwave boxes. Japanese homemakers spend a considerable amount of time making Bento’s for their kids and …