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Baba’s (golf course road, gurugram).

In a NUtshell A retro look, new restaurant in the happening golf course road, that has good service, serves good food, special mention to an unusual but excellent butter chicken Address & other details: baba’s Meal for 2: ₹500 onwards Cuisine type : vegetarian & non vegetarian Disclaimer: All restaurants / eateries reviewed by YUMMRAJ were visited by YUMMRAJ himself & he has paid for … Continue reading Baba’s (golf course road, gurugram).

Kake da Hotel (67, Municipal Market, Outer Connaught Circle, Connaught Place, New Delhi)

YUMMRAJ demytifies the legend of Kake da Hotel

In a nutshell:

Perfect value for money proposition with some super YUMM, some just about YUMM & some ordinary food.

Kake da Hotel

Address & other details: Outer circle CP

Meal for 2: Rs. 160 onwards

Cuisine type: nonvegetarian & vegetarian

Short Description – in case u r in a hurry:

As most of my Indian readers wud know, ‘Hotel’ here refers to a restaurant.

keema kaleji at kake da hotel

If good ambience is a must for u stepping into an eatery, Do not go here. U might come across uncomfortable scenes like swarms of flies, a guy lying down in the first floor corner, loud co-diners , heaps of semi processed onions or worst, even a rat. However, if u wanna have good to great food at prices lower than imagination, check this place out.

A restaurant that has been around for 80 years, Kake da hotel has quite a following. Situated in the outer circle of Connaught place, the hotel, like its neighbours (National Restaurant, Royal Restaurant etc), has a tiny seating area on the ground floor & has a slightly spacious first floor. The first floor is supposedly for ‘family’ crowd but I prefer the ground floor as that shows the real character of the place.

A section of the Ground floor dining room & the stairs for going to 1st floor

Very Few ladies cud be seen on the ground floor that is usually packed with individual / groups of men. Unknown people share tables due to lack of space. The area is quite crammed – u can hear almost every word that is being spoken in the table next to u.

The entrance to the Restaurant is beside a Glass front that has become smoky. Behind the Glass wall are a row of 8 – 10 dekchis (huge metal containers) on which meats of different kinds r constantly being slow cooked.

People walk in, order a curry, eat that with as many rotis they want, ask for just gravy coz that costs less (than ordering a full repeat of the dish with meat).

butter chicken at Kake da hotel

As soon as order is placed, the curry is picked up from the dekchi to serving plate & served immediately. The gravy is usually all over the plate & no one bothers to clean that up before serving to the customer.

There are several types of rotis on offer & Roti takes a while to make & serve – ‘garma garam’.

All food is made from pure desi ghee – proclaims a writing on the wall. In some dishes that comes out very clearly, in some others it does not.

By Delhi standards the prices r a steal. Price of the curries is approx. INR 130 – 140 per plate & rotis start at INR 5 per piece!!!

Menu card on the wall of Kake da hotel (click on the picture to see enlarged image)

Service is as fast as it can get. Waiting staff have been around for years & some of them have become numb. They r obviously not ‘Hotel Management trained’ like their swanky restaurant counterparts – just being a normal nice human being yields good results. I tried asking our waiter for a recommendation. ‘All is good’ was the answer. I tried 3 times with interval of 10 – 15 minutes. Answer was consistent. He was however very attentive of the way we were finishing up. As soon as we were left with 25% of the roti, he wud appear – Do u want another one?

Detailed description – In case u have the time to njoy reading:

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British Airways inflight food

Route: Delhi to London Heathrow & further to the USA & return

Description:

I have always been a fan of Breakfast at BritishAirways. In the numerous times I have travelled, I have always looked forward to it. The lunches & Dinners that I have had were mostly good & some memorable. But the breakfast has always scored over the other meals in my mind.

Here comes the latest experience:

breakfast bowl with omelet, kabab, grilled tomatoes & hash brown

The Breakfast consisted of a ‘no frills’ omelet with less salt ( that is always the case in any non Indian setting) & hint of green bell pepper & tiny specs of onion. The Omelet was well done but soft, not brittle & had a simple yet good taste & feel to it.

This was served along with a full Grilled tomato that of course did not have salt added to it.

The Rounded patty of potato was very good – crispy on the outside, soft & lumpy inside. The potato was never fully mashed & hence it was lumpy. Very good.

The meaty kabab was the star of the show. It was not juicy unlike all other good kababs, but dry. It had a Shammi Kabab kind of texture, subtle flavors & taste.

Needless to say that this was accompanied with fresh fruit juice.

A Danish Pastry was served as dessert. It was crispy on the outer, glazed with honey on the top, it seemed to be having millions of layers within & a rich chocolate filling in the center. Liked it a lot.

danish pastry

Hours later it was meal time again. I did something that I never do. I did not request for a Continental cuisine but settled for Butter Chicken – figured out that this is served in Flights ex London Heathrow Airport – It was simply Awesome. One of the best Butter Chickens I have had in maybe the last 2 yrs. Cooked at London Kitchen!!!

butter chicken

I was stunned, shocked (pleasantly) how they cud make it so good. Better than most of the orangish tomatoee Butter Chicken varieties available in Delhi. Perfectly tandoored boneless chicken pieces, perfectly tempered gravy, spicy & a bit hot as well. As good as it cud get. The long grain basmati rice pulao that was served had slices of red chillies on it that were flavorful as well as hot!!! Independent strands of rice but melt in the mouth, flavorful & very tasty.

Totally unexpected & completely out of the blue & realy good. YUMMRAJ was super impressed

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