To read the history of ling’s pavilion, pls click here: GQ article In a nutshell: A treasure box of great authentic Chinese food, run by a Chinese origin family, this restaurant is a foodies’s paradise, only if u know how to avoid the Chinjabi dishes & end up ordering the original stuff. Food here reminded me of my days in China ……………. Address & other details: … Continue reading Ling’s pavilion (19/21, Mahakavi Bhushan Marg, Behind Regal Cinema, Colaba, Mumbai)
The Chindian (Indianized Chinese food) is tasty & nice but lacks on the authenticity front. For ‘close to authentic Chinese food’ in Gurgaon, YUMMRAJ recommends The Monk, Galaxy Mall. However, if u do not give a damn to authenticity & r willing to dig into anything tasty, Dine Esty is a good choice. Infact its a very good choice for a nice evening out with some good food.
The main dining hall – another view
We have been to Dine esty several times & always had been eating at the Live Japanese Teppanyaki (Japanese Grill) Counter. This time around we decided to sit in the main dining hall & ordered some Chinese (turned out to be tasty Chinjabi) alacarte section.
starter at Dine Esty
The menu card was almost 10 pages long & really requires a great deal of study by foodies to decide on food. Too many interesting names pop up before the eyes & ity becomes a challenge (in a good way) to narrow down & finalize the order. In the menu card there are sections like soups, dimsums, starters, main course etc like everyone else but all these section in turn have detailed sub sections – chicken, pork, lamb, vegetarian, duck, fish, crab, seafood. I saw some interesting items like seafood dimsum, crystal dimsum, pork gouza, prawn harkaw (a dimsum that has potato starch as wrapper) – I fondly remembered harkaw that we had at Royal china. To summarize, every Chinese place has sections but this one was in great details.
The interior has three sections – a lounge & bar setting on the left (as u enter) & this is covered by a see-through wooden partition. Then there is the Main dining Hall with Restaurant setting & at the end is the Live Teppanyaki counter where u can sit on the counter & njoy seeing the food being prepared in front of u. A chat with the chef is also an interesting option. Getting the food made with ur choice of sauces is surely another option.
The lounge & bar setting behind the wood partition
The Japanese concept of teppanyaki is very cool though – it is essentially a flat Metal plate (say 1meter by 2 meters) that is heated at all times. The customers have the option to sit around this hot plate & the Chef stir fries veggies / fish / meats in front of u & serves fresh out of the Teppan.
Stir frying on the teppan right in front of the customer seats – u see the cooking right infront of u
Inspite of the fact that the sauces here r tweaked to cater to Indian tastes – the overall taste is very enjoyable. ………….. Infact not too many people might b able to appreciate the 100% original taste the way it is served in Japan or China. I Do love the original though & do not mind the tweaked versions at times.
Detailed Description – In case u have the time to enjoy reading:
Welcome to the Millennium city of India – Gurgaon. The name Gurgaon is derived from ‘Guru Gaon’ since Guru Dronacharya got this village as a gift from his royal disciples. The ‘Gaon’ referred to above, became a town over the ages & even today the old part of the city looks like any typical Indian small town. It is only about a decade back that the new city was built & this is visually different than any other city in the country with its numerous high-rises & swanky malls.
In spite of having a bombardment of Punjabi food on offer, surprisingly there is not one shop which serves an Amritsari macchi tikka as good as Makhan Fish shop in Amritsar or a Bhuna Baingan & Dal Makhani as good as Kesar Da Dhaba in the bylanes of old city of Amritsar. In case u have had the opportunity to taste the fantastic true blue Amritsari Kulcha on Lawrence Road, Amritsar, u wud hate to swallow down the breaded variety of kulcha that is served at most of the eateries in Gurgaon.
In fact, if u had been courageous to eat at Bajwa Ka Dhaba (opposite Highway King on Jaipur road), then u wud shudder at the thought of eating Punjabi in Gurgaon. I can’t resist telling the story of Bajwa ka dhaba – so here it goes………………………
