In a nutshell:

The best South Indian Vegetarian restaurant in Delhi

Address & other details: Saravana Bhawan

Cuisine type: Vegetarian

Meal for 2: Rs. 200 onwards

Short Description – In case u r in a hurry:

It’s a pity that there is no Saravana Bhawan in Gurgaon & we have to drive 35 km to eat a lunch or dinner here. If u reach after 1.15 in the afternoon or 7.30 in th evening, u will b standing in a queue on the shaded footpath. They just opened up a second restaurant besides the earlier one recently.

Food is excellent – Soft, fermented feel piping hot idly with some super cool accompaniments. Very nice & fresh medu vada, a huge list of tasty & interesting dosas, utthapams, adai, aviyal etc. In case adai sounds new, pls read the detailed description. The south Indian thali is very good & so r the South Indian dessert options. There r quite a few fresh fruit juices available & of course the filter coffee.

Detailed Description – In case u have the time to enjoy reading:

The idly is served soft, fermented feel, piping hot with the best green chutney in Delhi, a thick white tasty chutney, a dip of Gunpowder in ghee & a bit of a very interesting curried chutney. Murugan Idly of Chennai is better than this but this is the best in Delhi so far.

Medu vada is fried fresh & served straight out of the kadhai – has a mild fermented flavor & a thin coating. The one at Murugan Idly Chennai had a better flavor & taste due to presence of whole black pepper & few other spices in the batter. The crust of the medu vada at Banana leaf Kolkata was better than the one at Saravana Bhawan. So once again there r others in other cities who do a better job but for Delhi this is the best & very good on its own if u do not compare to others.

Dosas r very good – like quite a lot of them. Special like the spicy red filling Mysore rawa dosa & the Ghee dosa – fried with ghee. The potato filling served with dosa at Murugan Idly Chennai again beats the one at Saravana Bhawan hands down. The one at Saravana again is quite good on its own.

Adai is kind of a dosa made with lentils. Very very tasty.

The thali has rice, poori & a multitude of curries, dal, sambhar & rasam. A pickled & deep fried Red Chilli that is served with the food is unique & awesome.

Ghee poli for desserts is superb – light sweet, thin ‘sweet parantha’.

So r a lot of other desserts. U can buy a wide range of sweets for takeaway at a sweet counter as well.

The fruit juices r as fresh as they can get & r made in separate machines – So flavors of the fruit remain as virgin as possible.

The ‘straang’ filter coffee is too good & I never have less than 2 at one go.

Overall, it’s the best in Delhi NCR – We travel 35km to eat here & if I am not mistaken, we wud have eaten at least 40 times in the last 7 years!!!!