Zha/ ழா Cafe

Sometime last month I had gone to ழா Cafe . Zha Cafe  located at adyar (I don't remember exactly where but its on the same street as swingers ) coming back to  Zha Cafe. What an amusing experience :) made me feel like I went back in time without a time machine ~ the food, the music, the ambiance everything makes you  feel as if you are in the 90s :D now isn't that cool!

A few friends from work decided to go tot Zha for a cup of coffee and a quick bit after work since its soooo close to work I was on board in no time ..Needless to say we had a great time!

All the rooms in the cafe had a theme I personally LOVE the room shown above its MOVIE theme~ so you can see a director chair, hero's chair, heroine chair and villain chair :D isn't that funny.. The one below is for the more serious types (not me)..

I have to mention about the music they played at the cafe , it was a assortment of HIT songs from 90s this again was very amusing cos clearly the last thing you'd expect to listen to while going to a cafe is Ramki hits and Karthick songs :P

We ordered the TEA KADAI menu along with our beverages :) Like the name suggests the Tea Kadai Menu is complete assortment of all the snacks that you would find in a Indian Tea Shop ~ it was funny and cute :)

Sanke gourd vadai~ Podalangai vadai was kinda unusual yet tasty and filling..

Cheesy dips ..Yummmmmmm

So someone in the cafe was celebrating his birthday with his family he was just too sweet to distribute cakes to everyone at the cafe :) just like in school dayz hahaha

What a delightful evening :) i m definitely going back for more :)

Ok i usually love to fill out feed back forms at the restaurants but we had to rush out but i just love the look and feel of the feed back form too :) may b next time I'd give them a good review and come but as for now I gottu run!

Two words~ I love!! :)

Bruschetta @ Blur

My friend T and I have been having a series of super weekends starting last month, much to the dismay of many :D Oh Well! So few weeks back we went to watch a critically acclaimed movie at Satyam cinemas (by accident) Actually what had happened was we both were suffering from Vit M deficiency as in we were in dire need to watch a movie....We had not planend ahead and we landed there on a Saturday afternoon hoping to get tickets :D and after we realized tickets to all shows were sold out.. it was Smurf Movie Vs  BOL !! Smurfs were ruled out, so T and I ran out to look at BOL poster and see if it was worth the trouble! Hehaha after I saw Atif Aslam's pic on the poster I convinced T!! After all this trouble we realized  it so happened we were 3 hrs ahead when we landed there and we really needed a place to lounge :D

Now I know Satyam has a nice place called ID - Idly dosai (where I love) and Ecstasy for chocolate lovers and Blur.. but I haven't tried Blur before cos I always imagined it to be a noisy over crowded place which it was :) with bad food but i wasa wrong about the food- Ok I take back what I said.. I dint try too much because I was too stuffed from the breaskfast I had at S&S I just a regular Bruchetta and Gobi 65 with Tawa roti.. But it was enough to convince me to come back for more ;)

Mutton Briyani for Beginners

Briyani is one of my all time favorites :) in fact my Amma has a tradition of making briyani for breakfast for my birthday ..every birthday :P i know i know it s bit too  much but ahhhh who cares - besides its good to have a heavy breakfast :D and am babbling on and on again :D so coming back to briyani.  I  know it sounds like a complicated dish to prepare especially for a beginner but believe me its a cake walk and the simpler your recipe the better it will taste so I m going to pen down a very basic version ideally suited for newbies, you can master this recipe in no time and when you have done that please feel free to experiment with your recipes, So get ready get set Go!!!

Simple ingredients

Things you will need

Grind the following into a paste:

• 10-15 shallots (small onions) peeled washed
• 1 big bulb of garlic peeled and
• 3 inch piece of ginger

Mutton pressure cooked with chilli powder , salt and tomatoes

Keep the following ready:

• 2 ripe tomatoes cut into quarters
• 1 bunch of mint leaves- washed
• 3-4 green chillies sliced
• 2 cups of Basmathi rice, washed, soaked for 30 minutes and drained
• ½ Kilo Mutton - Pressure cook  with 2cups water and salt, 1 tomato and 3 spoons of Chilli powder for 15 minutes

Briyani in progress

How to make Mutton Briyani

·          Heat a thick kadai and add 4-5 spoons of vegetable oil

·          Add the following spices- 1 stick of cinnamon, few cloves, 2 star anise and sauté

·          Add the shallot- ginger-garlic paste and fry till the oil separates

·          Add the Pudina leaves, green Chillies and tomatoes and fry

·          Add 2 cups of water and bring to a boil

·          Add the mutton with the 2 cups stock

·          Add the Basmathi rice and cover with a heavy lid

Add the rice to the broth & bring to a boil

Your easy to make Mutton Briyani will be ready in less than 20 minutes

Garnish options:  You can use chopped coriander, deep fried onions or fried dry fruits to decorate your briyani :) 

Raita: Take a cup of  thick curd, add few pinches of salt, 1 green chilli and 1 onion chopped finely, 1 cucumber & 1 tomato deseeded and chopped , 1 grated carrot , mix all the ingredients in a bowl,  and refrigerate for 10 minutes before serving with briyani :) 

Prepare a simple raita out of curd, cucumbers, carrots,  tomatoes and onions

Serve hot with raita and  home style chiken curry.

See I told you its a simple recipe, now serve your briyani with raita and gravy and ensoii :) do temme how you liked it!

Once you master this easy recipe you can try complicating thing a bit: ;)

• After soaking and draining the basmathi rice, you can heat a kadai add 1 spoon of butter and fry the rice in it for 2 minutes before adding to the briyani, 
• You can also substitute the water you add in the briyani with coconut milk or broth entirely. 
• If you feel the briyani is too spicy add a few spoons of ghee before you serve. If you feel the rice will get over cooked add 1/2 lemon's juice to the briyani mixture and it cook.

Easy to make - 3 ingredient pasta !

I am a sucker for Italian food, there is nothing on earth  which beats a warm cheesy slice of thin crust pizza, hot and gooey lasagna or bowl of pasta :) I love to cook as much as I love to eat but many friends of mine keep telling me that they get freaked out when they see an elaborate recipe with a long list of ingredients and a step bye step procedure.. Cooking is really easy you just have to get the basic recipe correct and build your own style over time, I have given below a very simple Pasta in Red Sauce recipe, for those of you who love to learn how to cook, for those of you who are experts already enjoy the pics and be supportive :)

Ripe tomatoes boiled in water for 2 minutes

3 Things you will need:

• 3 firm ripe tomatoes
• 5-6 cloves of garlic crushed using a mortar and pestle
• 1 cup of pasta of your choice

Few cloves of garlic crushed

For making red sauce

• Boil the tomatoes in water for 2 minutes, remove the skin and grind into paste
• Heat a kadai, add 2-3 spoons of olive oil
• Add the crushed garlic and saute gently
• Add tomato paste to the garlic and olive oil
• Simmer for 1 minute 
• Add salt to taste & remove from flame

Keep it simple the first few times u make it just try it and you will develop great confidence in yourself and fall in  love with the flavor of garlic :)

Pasta of your choice -boiled & drained 

 Choose pasta of your choice and boil until its done and drain and add this to the red sauce in the kadai and gently mix with a spatula and serve piping hot :)

Pasta in red sauce !

Options for garnish: 
You can either garnish it with grated cheese or chopped cilatro/coriander

Garnish with coriander/cheese or crushed pepper

Options for seasoning 
You can sprinkle crushed pepper or oregano to suit your taste, I just had the pasta as is and it was absolutely YUMMMMMMM!

Serve HOT!

Ensoi your pasta and tell me how you liked it!!

MASH @ Besant Nagar

So finally I went to much praised, critically acclaimed MASH at Besant Nagar...how did i like it? Errr hmm ..Let me put it this way ..My mom raised me such that if i dont have any thing nice to say i dont say anything at all ...

Fiery Fotato

Hot chocolate

Kalamari Fritters

Kalamari with Lemon garlic butter sauce

chicken sizzler

MASH

~Fin~

 Ok I admit I m kinda sorta very disappointed given that I've heard soooooooooo much about this place..