Pelita Nasi Kandar, Pondy Bazaar

I had seen this place when I had passed through Pondy Bazaar and had always wanted to try this Malaysia cuisine. They have some supposedly authentic Malaysian dishes, which seem to resemble Tamil cuisine a lot. I had expected a mix of Tamil, Malay, and Chinese dishes. Maybe they tailored the menu card for this country. This place was filled with Singapore/Malaysia/Dubai returns or maybe politicians or local bigshots, with lots of bling-bling. The dishes ordered from the menu was OK, very similar to the local food. Who knew Malaysian Tamils had the same gastric preferences as us.

Ambience: 7/10 

Service: 6.5/10. The waiting staff were a tad unresponsive, and ignored us sitting in the centre of the room.

Food: 6/10. Passable

Cost: 3/5

The Dhaba, Besant Nagar

The Dhaba and Karaikudi restaurants are situated right next to each other, just before the Velankanni Church in Besant Nagar.

This looked like just another "dhaba" in Chennai, with white-washed walls, hindi songs, posters of hindi movies, and waiters dressed like Punjabis. They didn't even try to bring in the 

"authentic" dhaba experience that other places try to do. Moreover, none of the food seems to be like what I ate in other Punjabi restaurants here.

We started with Chicken Shorba - water chicken soup with a cut palak leaf, and masala papad. While the soup was bland, the masala papad was at the other extreme - too spicy. The 

complimentary marinated onion was good, pickled enough to tingle your tongue.

Starters: The waiter didn't recommend any fish or mutton dish from the menu. Fish, I could understand, being the 45 day ban on deep sea fishing. Mutton? So, we went ahead and 

ordered Patiala Kabab (good), Tandoori Chicken (not so good), and spicy prawns (good).

Main Course: We ordered Keema Roti, Aloo Paratha, Romali roti, Butter Naan, and Chicken Briyani. We burnt our tongues with the spicy starters, so we asked the cook to reduce the 

spices just a little bit.

Keema Roti was a new item we noticed here, so we ordered that. The keema stuffing was little, but it was good. Aloo paratha was just OK - with too much oil and potato stuffing, it was 

soggy. Naan and Romali Roti was as good as any other dhaba-type restaurant here. The chicken briyani was made Punjabi style - very spicy, again.

Side dish/gravy: We ordered just two side dishes, Mutton Rogan Ghosth, and Butter Chicken. It proved inadequate for the handful of roties we ordered earlier, and not enough 

mutton/chicken pieces to go around. I had to make do with the sour raitha that came with the chicken briyani for my aloo paratha.

Dessert: We tried to soothe our burnt palate with matka kulfi, carrot halwa, and lassi. The matka kulfi has become a standard in all such dhabas -- 60 rupees for a 100ml mudpot of 

frozen milk is way beyond my reach. The gajar halwa was passed on from person to person, success has many fathers but a failed gajar halwa is an orphan.

Ambience: 7/10. It was silent enough for us, and not too crowded. No Wash room here -- I had to go out, walk into Karaikudi next door, to use the restroom.

Service: 7.5/10.  No incidents, neutral.

Food: 6/10. Too spicy dishes, soggy rotis

Cost: 3.5/5

Total bill for 12: 3600

Delhi Dhaba, OMR, Thoraipakkam

This is one of the many dhaba clones springing up all over Chennai nowadays.

This had whitewashed interior walls with posters of Nargis, Mukesh Kumar, Raj Kapoor, etc. In addition, they also had tribal arts displayed, seemed out of place. This place seems to 

be tailored specifically for the IT crowd with long tables that can seat upto 15 people (the project team).

I started with  Mutton  Shorba, it was just kind of OK, not matching up to the standards set by a certain other Dhaba in Teynampet. It was just good to open my taste buds. We were a 

fairly large group, so instead of ordering many starters, we followed the suggestion of the waiter, and ordered two starter-platters - one Indian, and one Chinese. Turned out to be a 

bad decision. The Chinese platter was unpalatable (by Indian standards at least) and many declined to eat it. The Indian platter was good, with a good mix of tandoori items, kebabs, 

a whole fish (pomfret) fry, and lots of onions. The reason for ordering a platter was to reduce our cost of ordering many dishes, however, ordering 5 different starters would've cost us 

less than this one platter.

For roties, we went with the bread basket as suggested by the waiter. We got one roti of each type. It wasn't enough, so we ordered two baskets. Turns out, one was too less and two 

too many for us :-) Since we already filled our stomachs with just the starters, we were not able to eat much of it. In addition, we had ordered chicken briyani, AND mutton briyani - as 

suggested by the waiter. He must have had a good table that day. With the usual side dishes - garlic chicken, mutton rogan ghost, we had just enough  to soak all the roties in.

For desserts, we had matka kulfi,  - kulfi in a mud pot, carrot halwa with ice cream, gulab jamoon with ice cream. Anything with ice cream tastes better. 

Ambience: 6.5/10. The place was in a decorated shed, with too many IT people.

Service: 7.5/10.  No incidents, neutral.

Food: 6/10. One portion is too little, two portions too much.

Cost: 4/5

Total bill for 8: 4000

Clay Oven, Besant Nagar

This place turned out to be our most frequented place for a treat. With good food, and a nice, calm place, it is good even for couples enjoying some time alone. Whatever ordered has to be ordered spicy, otherwise it turns out to be very bland.

There is a nice little cake shop in the same building, which has a small but tasty variety of cakes. We always stop by here for dessert. I suggest Tiramisu.

Ambience: 7/10. Not crowded at any time.

Service: 8/10.  The north-eastern waiting staff seem to be responsive.

Food: 7.5/10. Worthwhile for a group lunch

Cost: 3/5. Worth the team lunch

Welcome

I Welcome myself to the world of blogging, and my experiences in the various restaurants in Chennai. :-) Hello World!