This is a review of Kerala food section at Coast Café

In a nutshell:

Nice café Décor, good waiting staff, continental food & some real YUMM Kerala food section.

Address & other details:  Coast café

Meal for 2: Rs. 800 onwards

Cuisine type : Vegetarian & Nonvegetarian

Disclaimer: All restaurants / eateries reviewed by YUMMRAJ were visited by YUMMRAJ himself & he has paid for the full Bill & tips also. http://www.yummraj.com does not have even one featured / sponsored reviews. YUMMRAJ believes in going to a restaurant in anonymity, as a normal guest, experience everything & give a honest account of the same to you.

I rate all the food items & then give a final overall rating which is a simple average of the individual item ratings. What the ratings stand for: 5 = Excellent, 4 = Very Good, 3 = Good, 2 = Fair, 1 = Disaster.

Short Description – in case u r in a hurry:

We came to know of this place from our foodie friend Rashi – without her recommendation I wud probably have not ventured into this place as I wud not expect a cafe to have such a good representation of Kerala food.

As mentioned above, the Cafe serves continental food and Kerala food. We chose to stick to Kerala food.

Unlike most restauarnts in Hauz Khas Village, this café has a nice & small lift for guests to reach 2^nd & 3^rd floor. That makes it easy for those with knee problems or any other ailments.

The café is in two floors. We chose the top most one which had a nice view of tree tops in Hauz Khas village. There was an open balcony which was earmarked for the smokers. There was a flower plant on the floor above. So at times when pawan dev wud b mobile, the smoker wud experience a mild petal shower.

Initially when the place was empty the servers paid a lot of attention to every guest. As all seats filled up, they became less accessible. Even as they wud stand near the cash desk, they wud not look around periodically to all tables. At times one had to frantically wave hands to draw attention. Net – Good guys , need to b trained to handle more people

The Menu card was a pleasure to read. All dishes had nice little descriptions below that made it easy to order.

Food in general was not that rustic – a bit Urbanized, a bit more polished, mildly Delhized but still had the basics right & hence very good to taste. Loved the overall experience.

Detailed Description – In case u have the Time to NJOY reading:

We ordered Fresh orange & basil blast. Menu card described it as ‘Fresh Orange juice, chunks of orange,  with basil & a dash of tabasco . What arrived at our table was like just like any other fresh orange juice. Other ingredients cud not make their presence felt. The drink was fresh and nice. Rate it 3/5

We also ordered Masala buttermilk – Chaach. The base liquid of the chaanch was excellent. It had a mild fermented feel.  No fresh tadka was put from top. A masala Powder had been sprinkled. The Flavours were obviously much less. Buttermilk at zambar way better. Rate this one 3/5

We went for Mom’s aubergine Cocum curry. Menu card described it as ‘ Home style spicy Kerala Cocum curry with aubergine’. The Aubergine curry was marvellous. It had the perfect balance of seasoning & was pretty spicy overall. Good spices made their presence felt.

Small round full aubergines did not add much to the taste / flavor of the dish but they were soft and nice on their own. Blown away by this veggie dish made from aubergine. Rate it 4.5/5

We NJOY ed this with Malabar parota. It was extremely flaky. It was Crisp outside, soft within. Very good to taste. Rate it 4.5/5 also.

Next dish we had was Laidback Fish moilee. This was made with Seer fish.

Here we cud understand the flavours of coconut milk very well. The sourness was not overpowering. Balance was nice. Subtle but very tasty. Rate it 4.25/5

Post this as we waited after ordering mutton sukka fried, finger bowls came. We obviously sent him bk with a smile. The waiter had assumed that we were done.

We NJOYed the moilee wih Appam. It was very nice. Soft in the middle, crisp outside. Missed the heavy fermented feel.  Rate it 4.25/5.

Mutton sukka fry was totally dry, as expected. It had soft nice mutton pieces that had immense flavour of good meat and also was great to taste. Grated coconut added to flavor. Fresh whole pepper added immense flavor once we wud bite on them. Rate it 4.5/5.  Excellent.

Last dish we had was Prawn home style curry – it took me two spoonfuls of gravy to understand why this fish tasted clumsy. So we added salt. Better but not good. Added some more. Finally taste got good.

Grated coconut was of dry nature . So the gravy was a bit grainy. Cud hv been way better. Rate it 3.5/5 after adding salt and rate is 3/5 for the way it was served. The dish was directionally very good but suffered severe executional issues.

We also ate Egg white appam. It was nice as well. Rate it as good as the plain appam 4.25/5

Post food we tried Belgian Hot chocolate in absence of any Kerala dessert. It was very good. Not over sweetened. A bit bitter. Inferior to 70% cocoa Hot chocolate at Chokola but very good on its own.  The taste grew on me as I kept sipping in. Rate it 4/5.

South Indian Filter coffee was very very light inspite of asking for a strong one. The flavors were less evident due to excess milk & less coffee. No comparison to the one at Saravana Bhawan. Rate the coffee here 2/5.

Overall rating of food & beverages at Coast café averages out to 3.75/5

Rating of just the food averages out to 4.2/5. The beverage maker is surely not doing a good job as compared to his/her food counterpart.

I wud revisit to try out the remaining dishes. Look forward to more.