Mani's Dum Biryani

I was supposed to visit this place and review it for Bangalore Mirror. So along with my guests, Manu Prasad and Nikhil, I visited the place last evening. We parked our bottoms on the chairs, and take a look around, and suddenly Manu points to the notice board - horror, oh horror! "Priya Bala has reviewed this place for Bangalore Times" said Manu. "Dye-am" I thought to myself. I should have been a little more thorough with my research of the place. For those of you who don't know, we make it a point to try not to review places reviewed by Bangalore Times.

I was crestfallen - that's one more place down the drain in terms of officially reviewing it for the paper. Nevertheless, we got down to business - eating. On the notice board, we saw a few 'specials' of the day, and so decided to order one of them, the crispy fried wings. Along with that, we placed an order for a chili chicken and a plate of chicken lollipops.

While waiting for our orders to arrive, we were involved in animated conversations about Twitter, the recent Sashi Tharoor + IPL incident, and a lot more. Turns out Manu and Nikhil and regulars Twitter users (since a message from Twitter is a twee, is a Twitter user called a twit?) and were filling me on the details about what happens in the Twitter world.

The chili chicken came first, and was very good, although, I did feel it ought to have been a little more spicy, given the fact that it's called 'chili' chicken, but maybe it's just me being fussy, you decide. The chicken was nicely cooked, and we liked it. Nice start.

Chili Chicken

The crispy fried wings turned out to be a standard fair, and it would have been better if there would've been a little more 'meat' in these wings. Taste wise though, it was good, and you can notice a little bit of their masala sprinkled on the plate that added to the taste.

Crispy Fried Chicken Wings

The lollipops were much like the wings when it came to taste, but luckily had a bit more meat in 'em. Given the location and quantity served, I think the prices charged are reasonable here.

Chicken Lollipop

Finally, we got to the main course, and decided to have the 'half' biryanis, and so two chicken biryanis and a mutton biryani were ordered and devoured in no time. The rice was cooked superbly, and even a look at the length of the grains in the snap below won't make you fully realise how long they were (similar to the ones we had at Saffron), and from what I've heard, you need a really high level of skill to get them that way. As far as the taste goes, I know where I'm going to be packing biryani from the next time :)

Mutton Dum Biryani

To wind things up, we ordered a 'matka' kulfi each. The menu also has mishti dahi, and we wanted to try that but it wasn't available on that day. Too bad, maybe some other time.

Food:Very good
$$$: Not expensive. Our meal, including 3 'matka' kulfis, came to around 570 (3 people).
Service: They take your orders, and bring them to your table(s).
Verdict: Must visit if in the area, or if in the mood for cheap and amazing biryanis.

Mani's Dum Biryani, Jyothi Nivas College Road, Above Cuppa, Koramangala, Bangalore.