Radhuni (Mirza Ghalib Street / Free School Street, Kolkata)

In a nutshell:

Spartan interiors, fast service, tasty long lost Bengali food & easy on the pocket.

the logo

Address & other details: Radhuni

Meal for 2: Rs. 100 onwards

kochu pata chingri

Cuisine type: Vegetarian & non vegetarian

Background:

Bengali food is usually associated with fish, meats & everything non vegetarian. However there r some extraordinary vegetarian food items made from leaves, stems, flowers, roots etc that cost minimal but taste YUMM e.g. Mocha (banana flower), thor (the pith of the banana stem), oal (root), bok Phool (flower), kumro Phool (pumpkin flower), kochu pata (leaf), kochu (root), lau shak (leaf) etc. These have unique tastes & flavours and most of these r different from the mainstream usually available Indian vegetarian food.

Short Description – In case u r in a hurry:

Unfortunately, availability of most of the items mentioned above have limited availability nowadays in bigger city markets of Kolkata. Some of these dishes r difficult to make & the rest r painstaking to make / need lot of patience. A visit to Radhuni can however bridge this gap – u can enjoy the excellent taste traditional Bengali vegetarian gems without having to sweat it out to make these. Some of the ‘vegetarian’ dishes contain shrimps etc.

Menu card with prices

Radhuni also has a long list of Bengali nonvegetarian dishes that r good but not outstanding. However, if u r visiting Kolkata / planning to eat out local cuisine, it cannot get better than this at that price.

The service is fast. The people here r nice – they r not typical trained Restaurant Server types. They r normal human beings who respond well to good behaviour from customers.

The interiors r Spartan – a lot like South Indian Udipi Restaurants.

Prices r unbelievably low (by Delhi / Mumbai standards).

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Machher Paturi (Bengali style Mustard fish in Banana leaf)

This is a part of the series ……. For the Chef in u

Contributed by YUMMRAJ’s favourite Chef ANONYMOUS
Super easy to make & Super good to eat……………

Machher paturi (fish in banana leaf)

U can try this with boneless fillets of fishes like betki or even with pieces of Hilsa (ilish) that have bones. U can try this recipe with prawns as well.

For all of u who stay in Coastal states of India, procuring banana leaf is easy. For the rest, there are markets in all cities that sell regional food – check those places out. In case u do not get it, use aluminum foil instead. The taste will almost be the same. The flavor of banana leaf will be missing.

banana leaves cut into square pieces for paturi

Take 1 inch size cubes of 300 grams boneless betki / standard sized pieces of other fish like hilsa.

Grind 3 tablespoons of mustard with 4 green chillies to a smooth paste. Grate ¼ coconut & keep aside.

The ingredients of machher paturi

Mix together the mustard paste, grated coconut, ½ teaspoon turmeric powder, 1 tablespoon mustard oil & salt to taste. Apply this paste to the fish pieces evenly & leave it to marinate for 1 hour.

marinated fish chunks

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