Cheap and awesome! – Janata Lunch Home Restaurant and Bar

For a place so famous and so good – this one’s not got enough coverage here! Well I will do my part in making this place famous amongst our fellow Burrpians! I have been here many many times b4. Primarily for the cheap booze but the food here is worth talking about as well. But more on the food a bit later. First the place, three levels, generally jam packed over the weekends and especially when there is some sporting event happening! But it doesn’t have to be sports to make you enjoy your ice cold beer here! The booze here is much cheaper than many other places which is a big plus! You could drink to your heart’s content and not make a big hole in your pocket either! For instance, a 30ml shot of rum/vodka costs approximately 30-40 bucks while a 750ml beer cost 120 bucks (For a Kingfisher). Now that we have wined enough, lets get to the dining part! Janata lunch home offers a wide variety of veg and non veg dishes with most of the dishes being Mangalorean (that is what my friend tells me). You would find most dishes priced around 80-150 bucks with each dish easily filling for 2 people. My group of friends paid approximately 150 each for 1 starter + 2 main course dishes + 1 Jeera rice + 6 rotis! Now that is not a bad amount to pay for such a sumptuous meal! Its not just the food and the booze but the place itself is quite lively. Infact its one of the few ‘beer bars’ where women can go as well’. It is not a surprise to see women at Janata so if you plan to take ur wife along for a drinking binge and don’t want to spend too much, you know where to go then! There are many places which serve alcohol and food but the quality and the price offered by Janata is quite unmatched. This watering hole thoroughly deserves the 4 star rating for serving its patrons with some great food and booze!

Address and Tel:  Dr Ambedkar Road, Pali Naka, Bandra (W), Mumbaihone 26005180, 32515596, 26004049

Adi’s – Biryani/Pulav? Decide pls!

I had the urge to have Biryani the other day (I have these biryani urges quite a lot it seems almost every other day!). Anyways, since we were a bit short on time, we went ot Adi’s which is walking distance from my office at Bandra Reclamation. Since I already knew what to eat, I quickly placed the order while my friend scanned the menu to decide on a good cheap offering.  So he just took a chicken breast piece and two romali rotis. He loves the romali rotis here, for INR 10 they are better than rotis at most other places.

I also ordered a lassi (Yes yes I love lassi, hey I am Indian, not some foreign bugger who drinks cola with his food! What is up with that anyways??). The Lassi was good, I liketh! The same cannot be said about the biryani. Don’t get me wrong, the quantity of the chicken and rice was good for 2 people (which I so shameless devoured myself.).

The chicken was tender. The rice was properly steamed and oh it had jeera in it as well. It was basically, Jeera rice, boneless chicken and a questionable chicken biryani gravy. Questionable because, it didn’t taste anything, was tasteless in one respect though it was quite and I mean quite theeka! It wasn’t spicy which was the sad part of it. Though I am sure the cook put quite a few spices in there, I think he just put too much of red chilly powder!! And oh the biryani lacked the condiments you get in a Chicken Biryani. I did finish the meal though (Yes, by now u know what a big hogger I  am!) I was quite disappointed in the taste department and to top it up, the dish did not satiate my appetite for a chicken biryani as I didn’t have biryani. I think I had – Chicken Jeera Pulav! hey Adi’s just invented a new dish! And I named it!

Haa, anyways, I am still craving for a biryani, but then I have so much home cooked food right now that I am sure I won’t be eating Biryani anytime soon! But then I think I may just slip in a proper Biryani somewhere between lunch and dinner!

Mini Punjab – Mini Fun Max Bill!

Alright then since the tag line is pretty evident that this blog entry isn’t about praising the restuarant I am going to cut right down to the chase.

Having been here once before I knew what to expect and so did my other friend but we were a bit surprised at the bill we got.  Oh! but before we go to the bill let me start from the beginning.

Ok so saturday night, looking for a place to eat some good food and I decided to check out Mini Punjab. Once we got a table we quickly ordered everything we wanted to eat. Lassi, Paneer Tikka, Paneer Tikka Masala, Pahadi Kabab and Chicken Peshawari.

Oh and one more thing, the place was stinking of pee! I was like wtf!! It wasn’t that pungent but it lingered and it just sucked. After a while I guess we got used to it and it stopped mattering to us. But we had to bear the smell until our food arrived which was after quite sometime. And the waiter even mixed our order. He forgot that we had ordered a Pahadi Kabab and not the guys behind us! Dont they write table numbers on orders???? (but offcourse all through the night I noticed this one particular waiter forgetting things. He forgot orders, forgot when we asked him for a finger bowl. Must have something going on in his mind who knows??).

Anyways once the food arrived so did the lassi. The lassi was so thick it was hardly lassi more like curd! And we were given straws to sip on the lassi but alas! they are of no use to us. We drank lassi the way it should be had and that is without any straws!! The lassi or curd wasn’t so bad and nor was the veg starter. The non-veg starter pahadi kabab, though, was good.  Not the most delicious starters we have had but it didn’t go into our ‘yucks what is this?’ list!

But I don’t think I can say they same about the Chicken Peshawari. The gravy was quite watery and quite tasteless as well. I know the gravy isn’t supposed to be very thick but this was like chicken soup man! Didn’t seem like there was much masala put in there nor was there any salt. It just wasn’t worth its 150-200 price tag. I have tasted much much better than Mini Punjab for much much cheaper though yes, the chicken quantity was quite good and the chicken tender as well but tasteless!. The paneer sabji was the same I would say. Nothing too great to write home about. Quite disappointed at the main course. To be honest, the dishes completed the whole experience of bad smell, slow service, forgetful waiters, and tasteless food! Atleast they are being quite consistent across the whole gamut of hospitality services! kudos to them!

I forgot the bill! The bill was definitely the icing on the cake. At 200 per person this place isn’t cheap especially with the kind of food they serve. They were given a second chance by yours truly to prove themselves and they failed at it. I so do not think I going there to eat again lest offcourse I have this strong urge to have some curd and my mommy isn’t around to make some for me!