Part 2 of 2

Read part 1 of 2 here – click

This post is being done location-wise

ahmedabad

House of MG

We have stayed here in the past a few times & have had their fabulous dinner at Agashiye. This time around we had other plans. So we managed to have a high tea in the afternoon & breakfast the day after. 

Everything about House of MG demonstrates depth of thought & power of imagination. Almost nothing is frivolous / just like that – be it each & every piece of decor, the attention to detail with everything at the room, the planning of the menu & the food itself.  

At high tea we were served few snacks. The green peas table tennis ball like kachoris were just too good – flaky crispy outer layer, sweet & salt balanced dense green peas table tennis filling. The sweetness most probably was from the green peas itself. 

The chaklis were crisp & excellent. We were very impressed. However, later we found the chakli served at Bhuj house even better – lighter & crisper. 

Breakfast – we had to choose from a menu & the kitchen would make & send those on order, fresh. 

Loved the omelet made with a bit of ginger & miscellaneous spices. It had an enjoyable juiciness, a perfect balance of seasoning. 

The marmalades & other sweet bread spreads were made In-house from real fruit / sourced from small batch artisanal producers . 

We also liked the rustic methi na gota – it was flavourful, rough textured (loved it) & extreme filling though. 

Juna share bazar chavanwala near Manek Chowk 

When we saw this shop from a distance, it looked retro. When we went in front we realized that it did not change & hence looks retro. 

An elderly gentleman sat at the counter. There was constantly a few people at the shop. He had a wide variety of namkeens, chiwda, bhel, crushed gram, soyabean strips & a lot more items. 

He realized soon that we were not from the neighbourhood. He quickly made a rule for us – ‘first taste. Buy only if you like it. I will not like if you do not like later. ‘ we did this for about 15 minutes & ended up buying a big number of packs as snack for the whole trip. 

Loved the chiwda, bhel, crushed gram the most, in addition to a few sew varieties . 

Bera samosa center near old city 

We wee walking past & saw this shop. The gentleman with us suggested this is good. we took one late first & then did 2 repeats – buff kababs & buff samosa. 

The kababs looked unimpressive but were very high on robust meaty flavour, texture & overall juiciness. As rustic as it could get. 

The samosas had an incredible good, thin, extraordinarily crisp outer layer & juicy buff mince in the center. Excellent in every way – flavour, play of textures, balance of taste. 

Atithi, Bodakdev

Our driver suggested this is a good place to have dinner. We were very happy we did. 

It was an ‘eat as much as you like’ 

Usually when there are many items, one likes a few & does not like a few. Here we liked each & every dish in a thali in which the dishes kept on repeating. The gentleman supervising the floor treated us as guests at him home. He came several times to explain the food & the ways to eat it / pair with. Excellent memory. 

Rann Riders, Dasada

The founders love food. That was evident from the seriousness & attention to detail with which they made simple day to day food so good. Everything we had here was locally sourced & cooked in-house. That included sweets like gulab jamun. 

Some of the ingredients were being grown in the estate. 

The restaurant not only had excellent vegetarian food but also impeccable meat dishes. 

Did not take too many pictures of food here. Got distracted with how good the food was. 

Bhuj house

What an outstanding Parsi food spread at Bhuj house!! This was the first time we had parsi food at someone’s home. Same dishes that we have had at restaurants felt much simpler, lighter, fresher & just too good. By far the most memorable collective Parsi food experience we have ever had. 

Kathiawadi restaurant, Maliya, Morbi, Onway to Bhuj from Rann Riders

We stopped here for lunch Onway to Bhuj. The restaurant served kathiawadi food

Of all the kathiawadi food memories of the past, this felt very good. The slices were not on the face. The scoville factor was not breaking the ceiling. 

The taste of food was very good.

Highlight was the sev curry with tomatoes

Red guavas , roadside, Dhrangadhra

Local guavas were very very red at the core, to the extent that from a distance we thought it is artificially colored. The guavas had small seeds, thinner ‘only flesh’ area….. very sweet to taste. Very High on flavour.

Khavda mesuk ghar

When we went to Bhuj house, we were served a chakli & some papdi. We absolutely fell in love with those. We asked here they got this from & they said ‘Khavda’

We got to know that the papdi we had eaten is called Nylon papdi – because it is super thin. It had a distinct flavour of daal, perfect salt (no excess) & was super crisp. I don’t remember having anything close to this or anything as good in delhi NCR or Mumbai. 

Gathia was soft & melt in mouth. It was just so different again, from most such things we have had in the past. Perfect salt. 

Another kind of garlic Gathia sev were Spicy crisp sticks – great to taste. 

At the store we got to know about two sweets that they make during winters:

Adadiya – dark brown colour, made from black gram (urad) flour, ghee & jaggery, dry fruits & spices (including black pepper). 

Gundar pak – dark yellow colour. It had wheat & urad dal base with gundar (gond) cooked in ghee & jaggery. 

Both were rich, juicy mouthfeel, smelled of good ghee, had an intense taste, not too sweet. One had to chew the sweets a little to enjoy the full taste. Outstanding. 

Krupali Sweets, Bhuj

At Bhuj house we got to know about Krupali – they said Krupali make achar themselves (not bought from wholesellers) . Local ingredients. Local style of achar. We were not too keen but went there & absolutely loved what we saw & tasted. 

He had Chhundo of mango & also of a local fruit 

Green chilly achaar was so unique in terms of flavor – like they used to be different in every people’s homes earlier, till the industrial bottles replaced all. 

Sweet red chilly pickle was super fun & hot. 

They also had Many kinds of murabba

Different kinds of Namkeen

We could not resist trying the home-made Gulab jamun & kala jamun. He strongly suggested gulab jamun. We tried both & liked the Kala jamun way better – coz very very few people make great Kala jamun any more. Few make great gulab jamun but that number is relatively more than that of Kala jamun, in our experience. 

He also had many other kinds of sweets.

The Prince Hotel, Bhuj

The Gujarati thali here is really famous but when we went here, the thali restaurant was shut. We went up the first floor restaurant & ordered mutton. We were told that all mutton dishes were unavailable as they sold out!! So we had chicken curry, roti & chicken biryani. 

Patel Dining Hall, Dholavira

Our guide at Dholavira strongly suggested that we go to this newly opened eatery. We had enjoyed our conversations with him & hence agreed to listen to his suggestion.

It was an ‘as much as you eat’ thali with different items like daal, kadhi , tamato sev etc. chaas was fresh & very cooling. The most memorable part of this restaurant was the freshly made rotlas by a lady from the village. She was really good at it. The rotlas would just soak up the freshly churned white butter & also the gravies. 

Dilkhush dabeli wala

There was something really good about the dabeli – a filling of spiced mashed potatoes  in the middle of a pav. The spicing was phenomenal – a bit sweet, perfectly salted, a tinge of sour maybe from tamarind , a bit of crunchiness & flavours of butter in which the bun was fried on the tawa. 

Excellent. Just too good. Beyond expectations. 

Imran Bhai’s Otau- mehmankhana

Imran Bhai also treated us with chicken Khawao cooked at his home, served at their community dining hall, Otau, meaning mehmankhana. Khawao is a local pukao popular at homes in the Banni grasslands area. It is made with a variety of rice from Gujarat (called jeera rice) as base, 8 different spices & desi chicken. It is eaten every Friday for dinner at many homes across banni. At home it is eaten by everyone from a common thaal – large plate. Flavourful rice, soft pieces of chicken, perfectly spiced. Felt like comfort food…. Wow what a meal !!!!

Thali at Shaam e sarhad

We had the last meal of the trip at the eco resort  Shaam e sarhad. The food had been cooked by the young boys from the maldhari community. I is possible that their moms cook better. The food the boys cooked was very good. 

Mawa

We have been hearing about the mawa but we’re not excited till we saw how they were reducing 25 liters of banni Buffalo milk to 7 kg mawa by non stop stirring for 2 hours. Daanedaar, juicy, not too sweet, creamy mouthfeel, extraordinary……