Cafe Moshe

Meal : Lunch
Rest : Moshe Cafe
Loc : Crosswords, Kemps Corner

Cafe Moshe @ Kemps Corner is one of our fav haunts and we end up here atleast once a week if nothing. I dont write about them often as it would be the same thing repeated again and again.

Yet, recently they changed and expanded their menu and i thought i would do a post.

The new menu has more salads, sandwiches, even a burger. The crepes are gone but the best dish on the menu, the penne stays.

Salad with Mushrooms, Barley, Sundried tomato and balsamic vinegar dressing. Awesome.

Moshes's penne is this glorious dish, cheese, paprika, penne in a tomato sauce. Served with jalapeno bread on the side. Evil good.

The mango cheesecake is seasona, peronally i am not a big fan of flavoured cheesecakes but this one was great.

Apple pie, unfortunately not as good as it looks and the ignored step brother of the mango cheesecake. Not bad but not great either.

Overall, this Cafe Moshe is fantastic with their food, small in size and quick on service.

Food : 9/10
Service : 9/10
Damage : 850

Hot Hot - Indigo Deli Launch at Phoenix Mills

Just returned from the launch of the new Indigo Deli at the Palladium at Phoenix Mills. It was everything i would have expected from the man who changed the way we approach cuisine (atleast in Bombay anyway) I have been a long time admirer of Chef Akerkar, his cuisine has been imaginative but also risky with some misses here and there. Tote, started out impressive but i find the bar to be far greater than the restaurant there.

However, the Indigo Deli at Palladium was fabulous. I am glad for once he didnt try to do anything new there. There is a comfort and safety in going with an old fav.


The place is well designed, modern, yet with an old world feel. It has elements of Indigo deli's design, the wood panels, the narrow lamps, yet with its open kitchen and long long deli bar it has its own identity.
The menu is bound to have new additions, some of which were being served, salmon burgers was one. The lunch menu on the blackboard for the first day was tantaslising.

Although it was the launch and they are expected to be nice to you, this was quite an experience. You know you end up in a restaurant way too much if the waiters know you well and keep coming by with selections. I dont think i had this much attention during my wedding reception.

The food was brilliant, everything was fresh and that really does elevate the food to a whole new plane. The salads were awesome and tasty. Funnily i was at the Indigo Deli for lunch at Colaba and they had nothing to choose from.. but the dinner more than made up for it.

The chilled melon soup was tasty but i dont think i could have done a whole bowl of this, too sweet but perfect in a shot glass.

Ricotta, pine nuts and a strong after taste of black peppers. This was pretty awesome, i think i had like three. Tasted so familiar but i couldnt remember from where.

Pasta in a cream sauce, sounds simple but it was really perfect. enough cream, enough garlic, a dish that can so easily be messed up, done to perfection.Actually it tasted just like mac and cheese they serve at Indigo Deli.Fantastico

The desserts were not bad.

Overall, it was a brilliant evening. Nothing to complaint about at all. Brilliant food, fantastic service, a large spacious place and an upmarket ambiance.

Add to that the visage of Mr.Akerkar walking around with a big smile on his face as he rightly should. My hope is that they keep the standards up.

They open for business tomorrow at lunch. I highly recommend you check it out, i will be there for lunch on Sunday to feast of the regular menu.

This evening was a reminder of a time when we were Kings, i hope to make it on Sunday and find its the same.

Food : 9/10
Service : 9/10
Cheers.


Edit : I was at the Deli for Sunday lunch and they were in quite a mess. Orders being misplaced, orders being forgotten, dishes slowed down. The food was fantastic but the service was flustered. In their defence, the place was packed to the gills and it was only their third day. I expect them to cope better in the days to come. A little dissapointed to see that the menu was not too different..

Tulip - AWFUL ! Avoid at all costs..

Rest : Tulip
Meal : Lunch
Loc : Warden Road

I remeber Tulip as a neighbourhood restaurant back when i was a kid and lived at Napean Sea Road. Unfortunately i cant recall much from my visit there back in the day. They downed shutters as i moved a few minutes away. So when i heard they were open again as a wine bar/restaurant i was intrigued.


The place is on the lines of an upmarket deli and is quite spacious. The airconditioning was on full blast and that was about the

The menu is expansive and goes from breakfast to salads, pasta and pizza. The overall themse is more or less Mediterranean, along the lines of an Indigo Deli or a Cafe Basilico or even a Moshe. All of which have similar menus.

We started with the Mezze platter (and stopped with it too as you shall see) it was supposed to be hummus, muhammara, moutabel and olives with fried pita chips on the side. So the hummus was frozen for god knows how long and tasted disgusting. We were served some tomato salsa in the guise of muhammra. the plate we were given was wet which in turn made the pita wet. Few complaints later everything came back but then again we asked for our moutabel which was not served to begin with. When we finally got it, we decided it was safer NOT to eat it and cut our losses. Got the hell out of there.

Tulip was empty which is probably down to their ridiculously bad food and untrained staff. While they were not rude in anyway they had no clue about anything. No one knew what was in the mezze platter and they had even less clue about how to behave. Shouting amongst themselves, refusing to come up and talk to us when we had a question etc, etc, etc.

Overall, i would recommend you skip Tulip alltogether and head to Banyan Tree Cafe at Pedder Road or Cafe Moshe at Kemps Corner.

Food : 0/10
Service : 2/10
Damage : nothing. we refused to pay for the food. 50 bucks for the Thumps Up.

Hot Review - Taco Fresco

Rest : Taco Fresco
Loc : If driving North to suburbs, keep an eye out for Citywalk on Link Road. Take first left, its a few meters down.
Meal : Dinner

A lot of people have been bemoaning the lack of authentic tex mex or Mexican cuisine in this city. I used too, however, for the uninitiated we have had good Mexican fare available for quite sometime. In Andheri there is the good but uninspiring Sammy Sosa and at the Taj Palace & Towers is the awesome but ultimately too expensive menu at Starboard.


So now, finally opens Taco Fresco, a franchise of the similarly named chain from California. The place is small, kitchsy and bollywoodesque. Posters, salsa bottles and dash of yellow give it a tacquiera feel. The place has indoor and outdoor seating but is smallish.

They start you off with chips, crisp, crunchy and overall fairly tasty by themselves.

They serve with two salsas, one a mild, tomato based one which is just delicious. The green one is jalapeno based and spicy but not fiery.

Now, the menu is interesting. They have gone authentic, which i think will yield them lots of resistance in Bombay. Chimichangas are not served as the fried, sauced goodies in Tex Mex but as small bite sized appetisers. On their own they tasted like spring rolls but when you mix them with guacamole, salsas and some sour cream the taste really comes through.

I took short portion of the taco, rather than the platter sized. Soft shell taco comes with veggies and beans with rice on the side. Same story here too, put all the condiments in and the dish works out well. The Mexican rice is just stupendous.

The Bean burrito was huge, enough for one person but not served with rice or beans. Just a salad and some sour cream. Tasty as hell once you add up all the goodies.

The Flan was delicious too, drowning in some carmelly goodness, it tasted divine.

Overall, its a tremendous effort. The service is not too bad, the folks are friendly and eager to please. The family runs the joint and they seemed to take the whole thing a little seriously, they need to loosen up, they have a good product, if they have a little fun, so will the others.

Food : I liked the food, i think its pretty good, i think the menu is well laid out and offers plenty of choice. However, the desire for authencity goes against the dishes. Some of them work best when there is rice and beans on the side. Guacomole was offered in tea spoons, i guess because its hard to source avocados. The Sour cream tasted like yoghurt. These are a few things they need to work out.

Also, their plating skills need a serious improvement. If you look at most Mexican restaurants the world over, they always plate the dishes in an attractive almost festive manner. Colorful plates, condiments used for taste as well as functional appeal. Right now, it seems like things being hurried about and a little cheap.

Food : 8/10
Service : 8/10
Damage 600

Pricing is tremendously value for money. two people can easily do a meal for 600 bucks, which is a very big plus.

Singapore Food Part 2

Another brilliant meal we had was at Margarita, a Tex-Mex joint in Dempsey Hill. Dempsey Hill has something like 2 dozen restaurants but Margarita is one of the popular ones.

the chips were crisp and the salsa tasty, just like i like it

They didnt have any Dos Equis (XX) a mexican brew i favour with the food. So i stuck to gingerale

My bean burrito was bloody boring

So i dug into the wife's chimichanga i think, she was not happy about it at all because i polished the whole thing off. the WHOLE thing.

Roti Parata, a weirdly.. for us its either or, never both. Anyway, like Roti Canai, this is quite the popular little dish in Singapore and it belies the cities Malay & Indian influences. Served with a spicy dipping sauce, this can be had anytime and is a cheap and fulfilling eat. Mine was plain but one can get just about any kind of meat put in.

Sing Food Part 1

I just had a fabulous trip to Singapore, one of the best vacations ever, great food, great people and one of the great cities of the world. No traffic, fab buildings and unbelieveable amount of time saved !

Since its city of expats, there are plenty of different options for just about everyone...

Bloody Mary on our flight in. Kingfisher, they do a good job.

The food really bummed me out. It was way too spicy and messed my stomach up so bad, i couldnt eat until lunch the next day.

The Soup Spoon is a popular joint, across malls, its part of the food court or a standalone restaurant. They serve some brilliant soups and wraps. I got a tomato soup, served with a little bread, for $5.50 you get quite a huge bowl. The small one is quite large.

the hummus wrap, was about average...

My friend Sam, took us to Din Tai Fung @ The Wisma Atria. Apparently it was once voted one of the top restaurants in the world. The cuisine is mostly Taiwanese, quite impressive.

Peanuts in Seaweed, brilliant to start off with

Egg Fried Rice, awfull !

Plain Garlic noodles, good stuff.

Veggie Dim Sum, awesome stuff, served with some soya, ginger shavings and hot sauce. The specialise in Dim Sum and rightly so.

While walking around near Marina Bay, we got hungry and checked into a cafe at random. Good call it turned out to be. The sandwich was fantastic, red peppers, mushrooms, dressing, aubergines.

2 Am, River Quay, got done clubbing and decided to check into some food. The wife makes brilliant choices when it comes to food but not this time. She skipped over the Lebanese place and choice a kathi roll guy.
Unimpressive on all counts. No taste, no spice, fresh paneer though.