Bite off more than you can chew at Uncle tea

Uncle tea is a nice space in barsha serving back to school, classic snacks on such pocket friendly rates. They have quirky quotes outside the eatery and casual seating area with some colorful interiors. You will love eating outdoors here, with the city views.

I fell in love with the place the moment I saw a giant picture of Albert Einstein sipping tea. Also, princess Kate was next to him. The flooring is so pretty that I actually took a separate picture of it.

We ordered aalu samosas that were so delicious, the filling was generous and loaded with good quality spices. We paired them up with uncle tea that was a comforting cup of tea evidently cooked with ginger and cardamom. Tasted brilliant!

We then had the crispy chicken wrap which was supremely delicious and simple. Also, their chicken burger was amazing. The burger patty itself had such bags of flavors packed inside. Loved it!

I ordered vanilla bubble tea but since they were out of lychee boba, I settled for tapioca and didn’t like it that much but it was pretty decent though.

I urge you to visit these guys and enjoy a windy evening sipping uncle tea along with the tasty snacks off course!.

January 13, 2019 0

Spoil yourselves at The House of flavours

Wouldn’t it be great if you never have to decide what cuisine you wanna have? Because this is what happens… one of our friend is a die hard chinese cuisine fan, the other one..not so much, he would love Indian food while some of us would wanna have hearty Arabic meals, some would want Filipino fried chicken and this is why we never settle for one place to dine in.

Fear not, House of flavors has got you covered because they serve Indian, Filipino, Chinese and Arabic cuisine all under one roof. Not only this, they have separate chef for each specialty cuisine so the authenticity remains intact. To top it all, they have separate menu-s for every cuisine they serve. I mean, that’s just super cool.

We started off with Crispy chicken that’s cooked in chili sauce with sliced peppers, it tasted amazing. The blend of spices and crispiness of chicken were spot on.

Then we jumped on the murgh angara that at first didn’t strike much excitement for me because I had it seconds after the chili chicken. But believe me, it was the most comforting curry with boneless chicken pieces dunked in it. It was lovely! They served garlic naan with the curry that enhanced its flavor. Naan were super soft and fresh from the oven.

We also tried the charcoal pepper chicken that was true definition of perfection including the pepper coating on top and the juicy chicken from inside. If you can handle high intensity spicy then this one is for you.

Next, we had the american chopsuey which was a giant bowl of noodles on one side and red chicken sauce on the other with a fried egg on top garnished with scallions. Imagine the view that was in front of my eyes, purely beautiful. The egg was cooked perfectly with the egg white hard and yolk soft and intact. The noodles were hand-made and you will definitely know the difference once you taste.

Then came the beef sizzler that made me skip a heart beat, sizzling luscious mushroom sauce with tender juicy beef and a grilled corn on the cob looked nothing but amazing. Totally love the mushroom sauce.

Thank you for the wonderful dining experience Team House of Flavors.

They cater to a wide variety of occasions. Contact them for more information by clicking on this zomato widget below:

January 13, 2019 0

Best chaaps in Dubai- Sadak Chaap

Sadak chaap is a small newly opened place in Karama (food street of Dubai). Their menu is simple and full of some beautiful flavors merged together to give you a fulfilling appetite. For readers, who don’t know what a chaap is, its actually small pieces of soya that are marinated in different spices and baked. Soya chaap contains more protein than eggs, meat, fish or milk. It is the best source of protein for vegan foodies who also wish to delve into an arena of flavors.

Their menu has such catchy items like “aam aadmi ki drink” and chaaps belonging to different states from Delhi to Italy. They’ve got it all!

Welcome Drink:

I started off with “Sadak Chaas” that tastes exactly like a mint and chilli chutney but even more intense. Don’t gulp it down like a glass of lassi or you will choke because it has some serious kick of spices. It’s meant to be enjoyed in small sips.

Chaap platter:

The chaap platter had chaaps from different states. There were delhi chaap, gujrati chaap, rajasthani chaap, haryanvi chaap, lahori chaap and I tell you that every single one of these tasted different. (in a good way)

I know you must be curious about the Italian chaap so let’s discuss this first, it was loaded with creamy cheese and had subtle spiciness to it. The Delhi chaap was similar, only creamy and no cheese.
My favorite chaap was Rajasthani because there were visible chili flakes on it.

Chaap curry was absolutely spot on! tasted so much like butter chicken (even better). The whole wheat paratha that came with it was so soft and tasty. Both paired amazingly well together.

The chaap in curry was velvety soft and melts in the mouth. Its amazing how their chefs manage to give so many flavors to one item.

Also, tried the delhi chaap roll. They actually let you customize your own roll but I was quite happy with their selection of delhi chaap roll in the soft paratha. It was so creamy from the inside. And the mint chutney was its best match.

Jaggery tea:

The jaggery tea was beautiful in terms of flavor and sweet element. Loved it. And guess what? It’s only priced at 3 aed.

Thank you for your hospitality Team Sadak chaap. I applaud your creativity in terms of menu and flavor of the dishes served. Many thanks.

December 31, 2018 0

5th Anniversary of Ghee Rice in Dubai

I am fortunate to be a part of Ghee Rice celebrations on their 5th Anniversary last night, where I tasted some brilliant dishes and it was a brand new experience for me as I have never tried Keralite cuisine before.

Ghee rice started from a passion to enjoy good food in a surreal ambiance in Abu dhabi and now they have officially opened their doors to Dubai. During last night’s event I was familiarized with their latest fusion dishes through interactive and experiential tasting sessions. As someone who has never been to India, I always wondered how their cuisine must taste like especially Keralite cuisine. I was afraid that their food would lack flavors and I was just proved wrong by every single dish that I tasted last night.

Amuse Bouche:

Loved the chicken kunafe and its simplicity, the crispy coating protected lightly spiced chicken mince that just melted in mouth.

Salad Tasting Platter:

If this is how salads are done, I won’t mind living on these. The chefs nailed every salad on the plate. There was whole wheat, muttabel, quinoa and fattoush. I can’t pick one because all of them were equally good.

Appetizers Tasting Platter:

The appetizers were absolutely spot on in terms of flavor, texture, presentation and combination. There was Inji puli prawn thats actually prawn cooked and dunked in thick tamarind chutney, curry leaves paneer, Mumbai keema, black diamond and Irani tikka. I vividly remember people went in awe of inji puli prawns the moment everyone tasted them.

Main Courses:

We began with the beautiful Rajasthani chicken lalmaas that was perfectly balanced with spices and the chicken was tender with subtle hints of orange color to it.

2. Keralian Fish mango curry:

This curry was densely yellow and tasted like whisper of a dream, the composition of spices in it remain unknown to me as I was unable to guess those but every element in this dish was lovely. I paired it with the naan paratha to enjoy it fully.

Keralian fish mango curry

3. Malabar Erachichore:

The servers untied a giant bundle of banana leaves to unveil this dish and the entire room was filled with aromatic rice. This was a comforting rice dish that tasted divine.

4. Le Cordon Bleu:

This is a famous chicken dish where you stuff a chicken cutlet with spinach and creame cheese and then fold it and cover it in egg and bread crumbs and voila! loved it here. Especially because it was a huge shift from classic menu here.

5. Penne Alfredo Pasta:

Speaking of a shift from the classic menu, there was penne alfredo pasta on the table too. And yes, it was beautiful. The Beschamel sauce was cooked to perfection with wilted mushrooms.

6. Australian Lamb shank dum pukht Biryani:

This was the main course that stood out like a champion for me because it was absolutely perfect and packed with bags of flavors, the lamb was falling apart on one touch and the rice were beautiful, each grain was separate.

Desserts:

For desserts, they served each one of us a dedicated platter with some amazing sweet dishes. It comprised of a gulab jamun, pistachio cheese cake, cheese kunafe, elaneer pudding, fruit creame and blueberry mousse. My favorite were the elaneer pudding and kunafe. Simply nailed the desserts!

Thank you once again for letting me be a part of your festive night Ghee Rice Restaurant, It was a pleasure tasting the new fusion menu.

December 6, 2018 0

Barbecue Delights- Fit for a King

I am so impressed with the food here that I am trying to find a perfect blend of words to compile this blog post. Barbecue Delights is a buffet based on staple Pakistani dishes along with some Indian meals too. Their ambiance is soulful and filled with different colors and wall art that basically represents Pakistani truck art. Their service is extremely amazing and this is one buffet where you don’t care “how many” dishes are there, simply because each and every dish is genuinely packed with bags of flavor and stands out. Also, the food is super quality wise, its always steaming hot no matter which dish you look into.

Starters: (Chaat)

Speaking of Pakistani buffets, one may never start their meal skipping the chaat and I am basically referring to myself here because chaat works like an insight into how good the others meals would be.
So, I got the basic pani puri which was served with sweet and sour chatni. The sweet chutney was intense and lusciously thick while the sour one was diluted to perfection and their blend in the pani puri tasted absolutely amazing.

Salad selection:

There were numerous salads along with the famous Baingan ki burhani that’s actually spiced yoghurt where egg plants are cooked in tamarind chutney floating on top. This area included fresh hummus, beetroot salad with sesame seeds, coleslaw with sweet corn, Tabbouleh and freshly sliced cucumbers/lemon wedges.

Mains:

I will start with the bbq items and then gradually walk you through the rest of main courses available. The bbq items that caught my attention first were the fried fish and fried prawns that looked so beautiful because of their color, they had a lovely golden coating and you won’t believe me when I tell you that they tasted even better than they looked.
The fish was marinated in just the right amount of spices, it was not tossed in extreme flavors which helps give you the usual flavor of fish along with the subtle spices. The prawns were super too.

Fried Prawns

Fried Fish

Then I lifted the mutton and chicken reshmi kebab dish and the smoke that came out of there was aromatic and tempting. I had unlimited kebabs, so much that I didn’t even kept a count. They were tender, juicy and full of flavors.

Then I jumped on the opportunity to gobble up some delicious beef haleem and mutton karhayi. Haleem was so amazing, usually in most buffets they over spice the haleem and it looses its original taste but here it was just perfect. Mutton Karhayi was state of the art. The blend of spices in it were spot on!

Coming from Karachi,Pakistan; one has awfully high standards of chicken biryani. It just breaks my heart when I order biryani and see coriander leaves or curry leaves on top of it. If you wanna know what a Pakistani biryani looks like, look no further but below.

chicken biryani

kabuli pulao

The kabuli pulao was comforting and light. Perfectly seasoned.

A Pakistani buffet without nihari simply does not exist. We eat nihari for breakfast, lunch and dinner all year long. Their nihari was so amusing for the tastebuds and the meat was so tender that one can not resist.

Obviously, you are going to need a tangy drink to settle all these spicy delicacies. I chose the lahori soda and I’m so glad I opted for this one (as recommended by our serving guy) it was exactly like a spicy candy I grew up having called “Churan Chatni”. Despite of its strong flavor, it also aids in digestion.

Desserts:

With respect to the occasion of Diwali, there were fresh mithai with my favorite moti chur laddoo and besan k laddoo.

Also, there were hot jalebi and gulab jamun (please excuse me while I drool a little)

If you’re thinking this is it, then nope! there are more desserts like shahi tukray, fruit custard, egg pudding, badami kheer (this one was my favorite) and jelly for kids.

We ended our meal with a cup of karak chai that blew us away with how lovely it tasted. Thank you so much for having us over Team Barbecue Delights, we loved every bit of our dining experience here and we promise to keep coming back for all of these extraordinary dishes.

To all my readers,
Barbecue Delights cater large events and parties, it is highly recommended to you from me.

November 9, 2018 0

Unlimited BBQ Buffet only for 55 Aed at The Grand Barbecue

Grand Barbecue is in Jumeirah where all the famous Pakistani/Indian buffet restaurants are located. It has a lot of space inside to fit a large group of people especially for parties or celebrations. Their staff is well trained and quite friendly, they are on their toes to serve you with a warm smile on their faces.

Chaat Station:

Started off with the chaat station that had so many chaat varieties lined up. I chose to have pani puri and mixed dahi puri chaat. Absolutely loved the chaat, it was loaded with sweet yoghurt and sev puri. I adore the fact that they were so generous with the chutneys.

Salad Corner:

I can totally survive on salads if they are as extravagant as they were here in this restaurant. A wide variety of vegetables in different dressings were available to enjoy!

License to Grill:

The best part of this buffet was that you don’t necessarily have to roam around and wait in long queues for the barbecue options because these guys place the grill on your table and refill it according to your liking.
The other great side is that they have so many options for both vegetarians and non-vegetarians that includes paneer tikka, broccoli-zucchini-cauliflower grill, shrimps, fish, chicken and mushrooms.

Mains:

The main courses were simply amazing because all the staple Pakistani/Indian dishes were available. From dum chicken biryani to palak paneer, they’ve got it all!

Six types of different chutneys were served on the table that go along with any of these dishes perfectly well. There was also a separate pasta station but my desi soul didn’t turn that way. There were all kinds and shapes of pasta that were made to order according to your liking.

Desserts:

After I successfully stuffed myself with every grain of delicious food available here, I headed straight towards the desserts section where I finally lost my heart because there was everything I dreamed of having. My favorite was Mishti Doi that’s actually a famous Bengali dessert and is a thick creamy textured sweet dish with subtle hints of sweet and sour.

Kid’s favorites:

There were popcorns, french fries, papadum, chocolate fountain, icecream rolls and so much more for kids to enjoy as well.

Thank you for your wonderful service Team Grand Barbecue. I am definitely coming back with my entire family to enjoy all of this food.

October 30, 2018 0

Go Gaga for Gabbar’s Grill

I’m sure you all are familiar with Gabbar Singh from the old classic Bollywood movie called “Sholay” that has inspired this restaurant and represents the cuisine at the same time (Indian). Almost all the decor is made out of old unused bottles and pretty colorful kites hanging from the ceiling and old sari used as drapes and so much more. I think its super innovative and smart to recycle all these things in this way.

colorful seat covers

hand decorated/painted bottles

Drop it like it’s hot!

We tried their Rajma masala and Mutton Roganjosh; it was hard to decide which one we liked best because both were outstanding in their own ways. The rajma masala was comforting and spiced just enough to give you an amazing taste while the mutton was so tender and the gravy was fresh and bright in color.

Sweet Endings

This was first time trying “Mango sticky rice” and I’m glad I had it here at Gabbar’s Grill. It was so tasty, the moment you dig in with your spoon and get that spoonful of steaming hot sticky rice with freshly diced mangoes, you’ll understand my happiness.

Good news:

They cater for events, parties and any celebrations you want to have with their awesome menu. All you have to do is go to zomato and contact them from there.

Thank you so much for having us Gabbar’s grill. We loved every bit of our dining experience here.

September 27, 2018 0

Amuse your taste buds at Sagar Ratna

Jodhpur is the second largest city in Rajasthan, India. It is known as “blue city” because whenever you see the houses over there, almost each one of them is painted blue according to a widely believed fact that the color blue keeps home cool during summers.
So when you enter Sagar Ratna, you will quite evidently see the color blue that represents their cuisine that is authentic jodhpuri/marwari.

We were served Makhaniya Lassi as welcome drink and honestly, I have never had a welcome drink that was this beautiful in texture (velvety) and flavor ever before. There was a cute blob of freshly hand churned butter on top of it, garnished with rose petals to enhance the look. I can have this any day,every day because it was that good.

Innovation on fleek

For starters, we were served Jodhpuri Pyaaz kachori which was outstanding in terms of both crispiness and filling. It should be a perfect dish to order in evenings while you sip on tea alongside.

The second starter were Karak Seekh Kebab, they were crisp from outside and moist flavorsome on the inside, delivering perfect taste to the palate.

The third starter was Chaap ke Sule and as soon as it arrived before my eyes, I questioned my own conscience because it looked so much like chicken. When I poked into it and tried the first bite, even then it tasted like one but the chef was there to assure me that it is 100% vegetarian made of soya bean.

Ghee Positive!

Before I enlist the mains, I want you to know that all the food here is made with desi ghee and it shines through each and every dish beautifully.

Ok, please be patient with me on this one. “Gulab Jamun ki sabzi” I swear I had no idea what it would taste like but oh my God! it was out of my expectations, extremely delicious. The gulab Jamun only become sweet when you dip them in sugar syrup so what the chef did, is that instead of a sugar syrup; he cooked them in a savory gravy. How cool is that? Brownie points for the innovation!

Then came the Papad methi dana ki sabzi that was super tasty and made with such precision, bearing in mind the combination of spices that eventually just melts your heart with its rich goodness.

We were served Jari Buti naan that complimented the sabzi dishes so well. I mean look at this naan and tell me that you can just have it on its own without a gravy dish. right? it’s that tasty.

Another beautiful dish was this Smokey daal makhani that is just what you need to unwind the day with. Its delicious, comforting and so light that you wont resist its perfectly balanced flavors.

Sweet tooth satisfied

For dessert, the chef amazed me by serving an amazing yet complicated dessert called “Bajra gur ghee ka churma” where you actually work with Jaggery and reduce it to an extent that it caramelizes and induces this sweet yet creamy flavor in the sweet dish. Accompanying this dessert was another famous one “Moong daal ka halwa”. Don’t think that the portion sizes were small, I assure you that they were tiny but mighty.

Thank you so much for hosting me Team Sagar Ratna and Mr. Piyush Maloo for giving us such a warm and friendly dining experience, walking us through each and every dish meant so much. My highest recommendations for everyone to visit Sagar Ratna.

September 23, 2018 0

Roll up your sleeves for “Roti Rollers”

Eccentric interiors, bohemian ambiance is what comes to your mind when you step in Roti Rollers at La Mer. Something so pleasing about their staff, they have the most warmest smiles that will put a smile on your face before you begin the dining experience.

Now, I know that the title “Roti Rollers” might be deceiving when you check out the menu in detail because there are so many delicious treats to choose from and the best bit is that all dishes on the menu are made carefully, bearing in mind that healthy food should not be boring. And that’s exactly what they deliver.

Chaat Station:

No matter what you do, begin with their pani puri and mix papri chaat because if you missed on these then it would be considered as a cardinal sin. The chaat was really tasty packed with bags of flavors, the intense chutney (wide varieties) complimented the chaat so well.

There are variety of chutneys to go with the chaat and all of them are freshly prepared by this gentleman. The chaat station is a colorful vision that treats your eyes and soul. It is beautifully decorated with hints of masala and chaat condiments.

Yup! that’s right. It’s 11 kinds of chutney with the colorful papri.

Cooler:

For drinks, we were served a power packed punch called “Minty Lemonade” that was super tasty and combined mint and lemon with a perfect balance delivering a zesty oomph flavor.

Mains: (Up all night, to get plucky & The Lamb-shank redemption)

I want to spare a moment just to mention here that the titles of dishes on the menu are literally awesome. I have mentioned my favorite two in the heading above and rest you should go and check out yourselves.

The vadaa paav was buttery and wholesome, the chutneys served with it were complimenting the entire dish pretty well.

These scotch eggs were cooked just the perfect way. For those of you who might confuse scotch eggs with another breed of bird laying eggs, I want to clarify that scotch eggs are just normal chicken eggs that are wrapped in crispy sausage and are kept gooey from the center while crispy on the outside.

Desserts:

So, if you are a hardcore desi like myself; you would know the importance and love for freshly prepared hot Jalebis. But if they are served with rabri? Dear Lord! I’m sold. P.s Not going to apologize for the drool worthy picture below:

Then came the showstopper dessert, Kulfi trio which was actually made from three flavors: Blue berry, mango and the malaayi. It was really amazing and the flavors fused together perfectly to entertain a kulfi-holic’s tastebuds.

Thank you so much for the wonderful dining experience Team Roti Rollers (La Mer). Your food made its way to my heart 🙂

July 29, 2018 0