Oh Calcutta!

No, I am not referring to the famous restaurant which claims to sell Calcutta cuisine in Mumbai and Delhi. In fact, if you are planning to be there, please drop the plan, it is the worst and most expensive restaurant for bengali food in the whole world even if you include the seedy bangladeshi joins in London. Not that... I am referring to Oh! Calcutta with an emphasis on the exclamation marks and the way the city was referred to when the first strands of hair appeared on my upper lip...
In winter, most expat Bengali from Delhi to Djibouti would, I guess fo that. Winter is the time when Bongs fatten up on some of the best foods that Calcutta has to offer whether it is Marco Polo in Park Street or Amber further up or Bhajahori Manna further down in the city, Calcutta is the place to be in in winter. Does not matter what is your choice of food, Calcutta can take care of you.. Does not matter if you are from down south, up north further west or extreme east.. it does not even matter if you are from Southampton of from South Pole. Calcutta has something for everyone in terms of food.
My memory fades and I have heard that there are new and much fancier places coming up every day in Park Street and other locations... But, my guess is that none can beat the old haunts of mine, Royale in Chitpur, Nizam and Amini near New Market, the chinese food at Tangra, the hilsa in Ballygunge Market, the sweetmeats in BowBazar, Mouchak and the telebhaja shops on Surya Sen Street, the punjabi food near Krishna Cinema, Continental food at Skyroom, sattu, the quintessential Bihari food in any of the streets, Sindhi food at Sindhi Society in Bhowanipur.... whatever you want you will not be disappointed. Any if you are a brown sahib you could visit Nahoums, Flurys or any of the Clubs, Calcutta, Saturday or the Tollygunge.....
The best part of the food in Calcutta some would tell you is its authenticity, others would tell u is the service, yet others would tell you is the taste... all of which would be true.... In fact, I can personally vouch that the best Mughlai food is available in Calcutta and not in Delhi or in Dakhan...... But at the end of the day, the best part of the food in Calcutta for an expat Calcuttan is the part when you pay your bills..... If you are not shocked at the prices...... you would be really below poverty line or mentally challenged....
In case you believe only in liquid diet.... Calcutta is the place for you... in case you believe like is a smoke Calcutta is still the place for you..... I used to buy my liquid diet past midnight from Kola Bagan and my smoke right on the pavement adjcent to my hostel on Peary Charan Sircar Street - a much renowned street between the side entrace to the University of Calcutta and my alma mater, the Presidency College....
So every winter, whereever I am, my thoughts go back to Calcutta... Ask any Bongs, they would agree with me.....

That was my city of joy....... all other cities have been cities of pleasure but never of joy:)

First Love

Food is my first love.
I can say this with a lot of commitment and conviction knowing full well that my wife, my daughter, my mother, my sister and three people who I call friends and who have stuck with me through thick and thin for the last 5 years to the last two decades do not read blogs:) [That is what I call freedom of expression].

I am agnostic about food.
I use the word not in the recent sense of technology but in the original sense of religion [techies are using a lot of serious words without understanding them nowadays]
I love food irrespective of where they origin and who cooks them. That is agnosticism for me.

I am religious and dogmatic about food.
Food should be good to taste and made of good ingredients. That is what I mean by I am religious and dogmatic about food.

Armed with the above parameters [again a word which is pythagorean but currently being used by IT project managers], for the last one year I have been hunting for good eating places in Mumbai.

Again, I must mention that my search for good food in Mumbai is not dependent on a) Times Good food guide or Vir Sanghvi's Rude Food or any such tome [I think they are fake]. My tongue and pockets are the best judge. b) secondly, I have my biases: However good a dal is it cannot be sweet, for example, you cannot make a sphageti bolognaise with chicken mice, for example, and there are not diet sweets.....

With such huge biases I have drawn up a list of places where I would like to visit again and again. The list is random:

1. Mondy: Value for money for so called continental food and reasonably priced booze. [Leopold is horrible but the cylinders they serve their pitchers are interesting]
2. Copper Chimney [Good Indian veg and non-veg food, they make their rotis with atta not with maida] Please avoid Delhi Durbar in Colaba if you know your food.
3. JafferBhai: best Mughlai takeaway if you know what to order and if you do not compromise with your mughlai dishes [no salt no chilly types keep out]
4. Taj Mahal lunch buffet [if you like cold cuts and salads for lunch there is no better place than this. They also have a wide selection of "Indian" dishes from Kolkata to Goa]
5. Ivy Bistro best value for money, preparation and excellent wine. Must try the red and white port here. The costs are a real steal here and the bakery stuff is the best
6. Gordon House: The best Indian Chinese in the Chinese restaurant in the ground floor.
7. Sports bar buffet lunch on a late Friday afternoon with beer: Good value for money and you can just gorge on the salads and soups.

I am still working on the list and will update whenever possible. Also, I forget the names of some places which I liked: E.g.; the small place in Malad where they served exquisite chilly meat balls [beef]; or the numerous takeways which are great value for money Or even my local bar ani restaurant where they can prepare a chilly chicken to order.

Please do not take my views lightly if you care either for your stomachs or for your wallets, since my opinion is based on spending my hard earned money and experimenting on my rather mature stomach.

Last but not the least: If you love bengali sweets please not got to sweet bengal try visiting Brijwasi instead.

Bon Apetit