In a nutshell:

A real Dhaba (now somewhat urbanized) in the middle of Glitzy buildings in millennium city, serves rustic, intense, YUMM food at prices that r still 1990s by Gurgaon standards.

Address & other details:  Bhai ji ka dhaba.

Meal for 2: Rs. 300 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 who has been here few times & strongly recommended it to us.

On a weekday this place is choc a blok with the crowd from adjoining offices. The evenings r slightly leaner given the fact that the Dhaba does not serve daaru. We went in on a Saturday winter afternoon & I guess it couldn’t hv been  better for us.

Pricing is real Dhaba pricing by Gurgaon standard. U might get at most twice as good food at 4 times the price at Dhaba by Claridges or any other such standard restaurant. 4 of us ate & rolled out of the restaurant by paying out just Rs 1115.

Many dishes had quarter plate, half plate & full plate options.

Seating was on PVC chairs & tables.

The dhaba is open air – Some tables were right under the sky – some others were in the shade of trees. I quite liked the ambience, which I thought was suited for summer evenings & winter days.

The server boy was pretty young & he did not write our order – He just listened to us & rattled off exactly the same, in the same order. I was surprised that such people still exist in Gurgaon where we hv at times received the wrong food / wrong detail (add sugar/ don’t add sugar etc) even after waiter has written the order.

Food was generally good / very good / excellent. Loved it.

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

We started our lunch with Tandoori chicken – It was not dry but not soggy either, the masalas were good and enjoyable – not on the face but good enough to b felt, the kabab was crispy outside, somewhat juicy inside but not too juicy inside.

The meat was very soft & the kababs had charred ends that were very good. What was nice was that the masalas were not over powering. The masala was properly cooked & not overdone. It had the perfect balance of seasoning.

Fresh chicken was used it seemed. I guess the meat was non refrigerated, hence the freshness cud b felt in al pieces. That is a big deal in a city where a good % chicken smells of unfreshness due to over refrigeration & lack of FIFO.

This tandoori chicken was better than many places in Gurgaon & I wud say pretty close to the top 10% tandoori chicken in Delhi. Rate it 4.5/5

We moved on to our next dish Yellow Dal tadka – it was so very nice. Subtle, not on the face but yet very flavorful.

The independent ‘grains’ of the dal cud b seen but they were very soft, not undercooked, thus giving a nice texture to the dal. One of the best surprises for us that afternoon. Rate the daal 4.5/5.

The next dish we tried was Kadhai paneer. Super soft, fresh, good quality paneer had been used for this. It was served in a thickish tomato based gravy, with capsicum & onion chunks, topped with cream. The gravy inspite of being tomato base was not irritatingly tomatoeee. Infact it was pretty good to taste. It had perfect balance of salt, sour & a tinge of sweetness from onion. Loved it & rate it 4.25/5

Moving on to Adraki dhania chicken Good quality chicken. It had juicy pieces of chicken that were soft & YUMM. The gravy was very nice – I wud say Finger licking good. Loved occassionally munching on the juliennes of ginger that were interspersed in the gravy. The gravy was tangy & just too good. Rate it 4.5/5.

We asked suggestions for a mutton dish & our server suggested ‘Mutton Roganjosh’.

He said it was the best among mutton dishes but it turned out to b the weakest among all other dishes but good on its own.

I wud hv been a fool to imagine that this dhaba wud serve authentic Kashmiri roganjosh. This term ‘Roganjosh’ has been organically bastardized across the world & is now loosely used to describe any random mutton curry. In case u hv not had the real Kashmiri Roganjosh, u wud not know how different it is.

Coming to our fake Roganjosh, the Mutton was very soft, was excellent quality meat & just perfectly cooked – the flavors of the meat were retained.Rate the mutton pieces 4.5/5

The gravy was not bad to taste but not great either. It had perfect seasoning but it lacked in the flavor part. Rate the gravy 2.5/5

Overall rating of this dish averages out to 3.5/5

Stuffed naan had stuffing of aloo, paneer & spices. It was super soft but not soggy , flavors were good. Loved it & rate it 4/5

Missi roti had generous amount of besan in it which we cud really feel. The bright yellow color was not due to the haldi (added by many commercial establishments in Delhi NCR) but due to the color of besan.

The besan flavor came out well & its purity took the missi roti to almost a chilla like taste (though wth a very different texture). Rate the missi roti 4.25/5

Last was pineapple raita similar to the one we had at Havemore. It was more of a sweetdish than a raita. Pieces of pineapple were generous. No addition of any bhuna masala /any other masalas / rock salt.

First time it landed in the mouth, there was a temporary shock due to the unexected sweetness but then it grew on us. Rate it 4.25/5.

Overall rating of food at Bhai ji ka Dhaba averages out to 4.23/5. I super loved this experience & look forward to more.