Friday 5 September 2008

diwana bhel poori house

m and i eventually managed to assuage our chaat cravings although our choice of evening was far from promising as it was on a very rainy friday. chaat is indian street food and includes a medley of ingredients; a bit sweet and a bit sour, lots of tang and crispness and lots of yoghurt too. our choice of place, diwana on drummond street has a reputation for good chaat.

we landed up ordering a couple of starters (papri chaat, pani puri and aloo chana chaat) and for the mains we split a dosa. papri chaat brings together crisp and crackle with the sweet tang of tamarind sauce and the coolness of yoghurt. it’s also got chickpeas in it. eating pani puri is a messy yet very satisfying affair. you take one of the puri’s, tap into the surface to make a small hole into which you drop a few chickpeas, you then take the little puri and dip it into the sweet tamarind water (pani) after which it should follow to your mouth in quick succession. you have to eat the whole thing in one go otherwise there will be tamarind water all over you. aloo (potato) and chana (chickpea) chaat is just what it’s ingredients say. it’s got yoghurt and some tamarind sauce in it and all the flavours come together to make a wonderful treat.


a dosa is a south indian pancake (albeit much bigger in size). it’s made of rice and gram flour and is usually stuffed with vegetables and accompanied on the side by chutney and pickles. ours came to us on trademark indian stainless steel dishes and was long and stuffed to the brim with mashed potatoes, fried onions and spices. along with it was a sweet and salty coconut chutney and some chilli chutney too. we worked our way slowly through all the food we ordered by the end of which we were utterly full.

we rounded the meal of with masala chai which was a failed experiment. either the cook was having a bad day and added too much masala or it was just the tea itself but the peppery hotness of it burned our throats. i can say it must be good for someone who had a sore throat because a couple of sips down and i felt like i had been cleansed. so… avoid the masala tea next time…but if you are in a mood for good indian street food this is the place to be.