Nilgiri’s did it again!

It’s always a pleasure to dine at Nilgiri’s. I must admit, this time around we have had one of the most interesting menus.  Here’s what we had:

Starters

Aloo Chana Dal Samosa with pomegranate chutney (above)

Thanda Baingan (charred eggplant | dry lentil chutney | seasoned yoghurt & caramelised onions)

Paneer Tikka Chaat (tandoor-cooked ‘paneer’ | mint chatni | spiced chick peas & ‘besan’ vermicelli)

Main Dishes

Bhindi Til Aur Imli (baby okra | ground sesame, tamarind & curry leaf sauce)

Zeera Gobhi Saag (cauliflower flowerettes | roast cumin, coriander & turmeric garlic & fenugreek tempered spinach puree)

Paneer Methi Kofta (house-made fresh ‘paneer’ kofta fresh fenugreek & ginger filling | ‘malai’ sauce)

Lahsooni Dal Makhani (slow-cooked trio of lentils fresh garlic & ‘pepe saya’ ghee ‘tadka’). I must admit, Nilgiri’s dhal is an absolute triumph! It’s so creamy and moorish.

Pilaf (above)

Dessert

Fig Almond & Honey Kulfi (fig & local ‘two creeks’ honey-flavoured Indian ice-cream with almonds)

Restaurant Review: Bliss & Chips, Newtown

We have been wanting to try Bliss & Chips since they opened in 2015. On one of those days, we just happen to be in Newtown and were ready to have a late lunch. There it was: Bliss & Chips.

For those of you who don’t know what kind of a place Bliss and Chips is… It’s a vegan fish and chips place. I remember talking to a girl at Cruelty Free Festival one year. She told me that she had plans of opening a vegan fish and chips place but I doubt that this is her place. She was Eastern bloc whereas this place has an Asian feel to it.

They do battered faux-fish and seafood, deep-fried pizza, breakfast, burgers and desserts. There is a list of the sauces up on the menu because you order them separately. They have their menu on three boards on the wall as well as on the tables. The boards are in such chaos, it took us ages to decide what to order.

We had the ‘seafood’ basket (2 fish cocktails, 1 crabstick, 2 prawns, 2 calamari). I must admit, they were heavy, bland and all four-variety tasted pretty much the same to me.

We also had some extra ‘fish’ as seen in the photo below. They were no different to the other stuff in the ‘seafood basket’ at all.

You need to order your chips separately, like we did. And it costs $5 for regular size and $9 for large.

Our adopted daughter at the time had some quinoa tabbouleh and sweet potato wedges. She said the sweet potato wedges weren’t cooked properly. They had larger chunks in the mix and of course they were still hard inside after being cooked.

I must admit, everything has this tacky and cheap feel to it at Bliss & Chips like the menu (photo below) and the board. This is what I do not like about some of the vegan eateries. Because we’re vegan or vegetarian doesn’t mean that we have lower standards. On top of that, everything—pretty much everything—is deep-fried; you never feel good afterwards.

While everything being cheap looking, the food isn’t. You pay for your sauces, chips and pretty much everything that is supposed to go together.

I wouldn’t go back to Bliss & Chips in a hurry but if you must go, Bliss & Chips can be found in this address:
215 King St, Newtown
NSW 2042
No website

Sunday brunch at Delante with Berfu

Sometimes, we have late breakfast or brunch at Delante on Sundays. We love the place and their vegetarian breakfast options, too. This time, we took Berfu with us and she enjoyed her pancakes.

Prinz Myshkin, Munich

This place was recommended by two girls (really nice girls) we met on the train from Paris to Munich. We thought it was worth checking out. We did drop in for a late lunch after taking a few photos around Altstadt and doing some shopping but we didn’t get lunch because we were late. Their pedantic waiter said they stopped serving lunch although they had plenty of food in their buffet. It was weird not being able to get lunch while they had so much food on display (photo below).

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In the end, we decided to have a slice of cake to keep us going and book a table for dinner while we were there. Well, the cakes were nice but the attitude wasn’t.

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We thought we might have better luck when we came back for dinner, hoping that Mr Pedantic wouldn’t be there but he was. He gave us the menu in English with a slimy smirk on his face as if to say “I remember you” but luckily we had someone else to serve us for the night. And she was nicer. After we deliberately broke the ice, though.

Here’s what we had, considering:

I had Nansei (stir-fried vegetables with oyster mushrooms, bamboo shoots, carrots, scallions, broccoli and smoked tofu in teriyaki sauce)

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John had Koh Samui (wok-roasted peppers, mushrooms, scallions, bean sprouts, snow peas, pineapple and banana in a Thai coconut-curry-lemongrass sauce)

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These two mains we ordered are served with either white or brown Basmati rice but we weren’t told that. So, we ended up with white rice (below).

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I didn’t have a dessert but John had Crème Brulee (below).

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We had high hopes for this place as it is one of the best vegetarian restaurants of Munich. The food was OK; nothing special but the service was unfriendly and a little hostile. 

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