In a nutshell:

A nice restaurant with some lipsmacking food (including a special platter of Nepali & Marathi food) managed by a rare breed of passionate, warm, talented and professional people who take excellent care of guests.

Address & other details:  Silver saloon

Google map: Silver saloon

Meal for 2: Rs. 2000 onwards

Cuisine type :  vegetarian

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:

Rare breed of people in today’s context – Yes, they r. In general I always quite like the hospitality at hotels of Taj group – there is a general sense of warmth & personal touch. So with high expectation we went to dine at the only restaurant in Usha Kiran Palace (a heritage property in Gwalior).  This experience managed to exceed my already high expectations. No plastic smiles, no ‘I am doing my job professionally like a robot’ etc. but genuine Warmth, Genuine Human interaction, passion for what they do, to keep no stone unturned to make sure guests have a comfortable meal – We were truly impressed.

The restaurant is not as big / does not look as grand as some of the restaurants in the best of the Taj Hotels in the country. It is relatively smaller but nice. Tables r a bit near to each other.

Red velvet seats draw the most attention. There is live Indian Instrumental music playing in the evenings.

A wall of the restaurant is full glass & one can look out into the beautiful coutyard (aangan) outside.

There r options for outside seating as well.

The menu card is well laid out & explains the dishes pretty well.

Loved the food here & above that – loved the overall experience

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

We had several food items here at different times. Here is a description of all of them.

On one occasion we had a Greek Salad. Fresh crunchy veggies, cubes of cottage cheese,  cheese shavings on the top & most importantly an outstanding , perfectly balanced , YUMM dressing. Loved munching on this & rate it 4/5.

On another occasion we had a sandwich. As we were looking for options, the Chef was passing by & said hello. After a short conversation I did what I love doing the most – I said ’Pls give me any sandwich that u can make the best. We open to eating anything’. This generally works coz then Chef comes out with the best.

Yes, we were spot on. We got one of the finest sandwiches that I have eaten in a while. Crisp layers of white bread with layers of freshly fried bacon, soft (but not runny) & creamy eggs & ham. Perfect interplay of textures & just YUMM to taste. Super loved it & rate it 4.5/5.

One of the dinners we had a thali that is unique to this restaurant. It had dishes from Nepali & Marathi cuisines. Surprised? Well , the reason is that one of the Ranis (of the family who made this palace) is from Nepal & the other rani is a Maratha.

In hindsight we shud have shared one platter & shud have added on some a la carte dishes & breads – that wud have let us taste an even wider variety of food.

The platter had a Nepali saag dish, Marathi Bharwan baingan, Nepali style Daal, Nepali fish preparation – sekuwa, Marathi chicken curry & Marathi style black masala mutton.

The Nepali saag was somewhat pungent (not on the face) due to use of mustard oil. It was a smooth saag dish that was nothing short of awesome in terms of taste, flavor or texture.

That evening, it competed with the non vegetarian dishes on a carnovore’s taste buds and emerged co-winner. Rate it 4.75/5

Bharwan baingan had small , soft aubergines and a filling of masalas. The dry gravy had onions and tomatoes among others. The dry gravy was intense & robust to taste.

The aubergines suffered from suboptimal salt if eaten as it is. However when eaten together with the dry gravy it was perfect. Overall the dish was good and rate it 3/5.

Nepali style Daal had a confluence of flavours. It was refreshing to our palate but thoroughly enjoyable. There was a tinge of sour but the salt was not optimum to balance the sourness.

We added a bit of salt and it soon started appealing to our senses. The dish was good again and I rate it 3/5.

The next dish was a Nepali fish preparation – sekuwa. It was boneless fish steak tawa fried with spices. The flavours were very good and the fish was soft, flaky and nice. The final product was nothing but the Chef’s calibre to convert an ordinary fish to something very good. However, use of better fish (that intrinsically tastes good) wud hv helped elevate the dish even further. Rate the sekuwa 4/5.

We next had Marathi chicken curry. It was very good. Rustic, robust and very good to taste. I finished off the gravy till the last drop. Chicken pieces were soft & good to taste. Rate it 4.5/5.

The last dish was black masala mutton . It was intense, robust, rustic , a bit grainy, had flavours of meat and masalas. The mutton pieces were soft & excellent. Loved every drop / piece of this dish – salivating even now as I write this post. Rate it 4.75/5.

We Njoyed this food with fried rice (pulao), naan and tawa roti.

The fried rice had very good flavours and was yumm to taste. The rice however was losing softness with time (from when it wasserved to when we were having the last bite). Rate the fried rice 4/5 due to its sheer taste & flavors.

This came with a super awesome chaanch (buttermilk). This was one of the best chaanch I have had in a while. It was garnished with aromatic toasted spices. The top layer was creamy and fluffy. Loved that feeling. The main drink was thin (not too thin). Balance of taste was commendable.  Loved every bit of the taste. Rate it 4.5/5

By the time it was dessert time, we were totally full. Generally in that state newer foods arriving on the table does not excite as much.

First we got pooran poli – in simple terms, a marathi paratha with sweet filling. Loved it. It was one of the best pooran polis we had in a commercial establishment. Super soft, flavors of ghee & daal filling & excellent taste. Rate it 4.5/5

The next dessert was another Marathi dish – Shrikhand. The ususal packed shrikhand tends to b over sweet but this one was perfectly sweet, balanced with the sour. Flavors of spices were nice. Very  balanced & very nice. We actually managed to polish off the full quantity inspite of being already full. Rate it 4.5/5 again.

We ordered a cocktail of chef’s choice. What came was a fresh orange based drink. Refreshing, perfect balance of sweet and sour, just the right temperature, excellent taste and just too good. Rate it 4.5/5.

Overall rating of food at Silver saloon averages out to 4.25/5

Did u ask if I will revisit? Of course yes. Every time am in Gwalior, wud visit to eat something else – Food made with care & passion tastes a lot better even if it does not have any exotic ingredients.