Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Delicacy (Jeevan Bhima Nagar)

Several months ago (around the month of October 2009), I had visited Delicacy in Cooke Town to review it for Bangalore Mirror. The food there was amazing, and also, one of the few value-for-money places. Even the vegetarians wouldn't have complained much (although the options are limited, whatever is there is quite good). Moreover, like most Indianised Chinese joints, the quantities are huge. So this past Friday, P, VP and I decided to try out some place close to P's house as he was going to get back late from work. He told us about some 'small Thai place' on Jeevan Bhima Nagar main road, and since I was going to be there early (I'm always the first to reach), he told me to keep looking out for a 'red board and a glass facade' on the first floor on my left (while coming from 80 feet road). And so I did, and when I saw the red board and glass facade, I saw the letters that spelled 'Delicacy', above a restaurant called Spicy Hub serving Andhra food. Delicacy! Woohoo. Why did P say "Don't expect much, it's a small place"? Probably going by external appearance, that's all, coz this Delicacy has the exact same menu as the one in Cooke Town, and I was thrilled.

As seems to be the custom at Delicacy, they served up some complimentary veg fried wontons with a sweet sauce. And since I was alone and didn't want to wait, twiddling my thumbs, and pretending to be ok (I would have been if I'd got a book, but I'd left it in the car and walked up), I decided to order a soup, and I asked the waiter for a thin soup, and he suggested the Tom Yam soup, and that's what I went for, and boy was it good. Initially, I just found it wonderfully flavoured and piping hot, but after a while, the spices started to tingle my mouth, and then when I realised that I still had half a bowl left, P walked in and after downing his complimentary wontons, ordered a sweet corn soup. He liked his soup, and since it'd been a loooooong time since either of us had good sweet corn, this was a welcome change from the messy crap that we've been eating at weddings and god-knows-where. You'll have to excuse the image quality - I was using the camera on the phone in an area that wasn't very well lit.

Vinegar, Soy Sauce, Chilli sauce

Veg fried wontons (complimentary) with a sweet sauce

Tom Yam soup

Sweet corn soup

With the soups out of the way, VP walked in along with a friend, and let's call her MysoreCanon (she's from Mysore, and uses a Canon, and there's a huge fight between Canon users and us Nikon users - luckily I'm playing Mr. Switzerland on this one). Ms MysoreCanon is a vegetarian, so P had company, while VP was the same old allergic, food-wasting, spoiled brat. We ordered steamed pork momos and Cantonese roast pork for us, while P ordered spicy soya balls and steamed veg momos.

Cantonese roast pork

VP got a call from one of his US counterparts at work, and so I got to eat a lot of the roast pork (devilish grin), and it was terrific. Some time back, I had written that the roast pork at Wanley is one of the best in Bangalore (among the cheap Indianised-Chinese joints), but now it'll have to be a toss-up between that and this (that = Wanley chilli roast pork, this = Delicacy Cantonese roast pork). Although the dishes are similar only in the 'roast pork' part, the sauce and seasoning does make a difference.

The momos were huge and were yummy. Very often, in the not-so-expensive-joints, the dough of the steamed momos isn't great, in fact it's not even and thick in most places, and also tastes 'raw'. These, however, were superb, just as they were at the Cooke town branch.

Steamed momos (veg)

Steamed momos (pork)

The spicy tofu balls were true to the name given - looking at the picture below, you can see the chilli seeds coating the balls, but when served hot, they were nice and crunchy, and weren't turn-you-into-a-fire-breathing-dragon spicy, but it the spice levels actually made the whole thing taste good.

Spicy tofu balls

P and I were stuffed by now, especially since we'd each downed a full soup, while VP and MysoreCanon don't eat too much anyways. I suggested we try out a starter again rather than go down the main course path, but P wanted some egg fried rice, while VP said he wanted some chicken dish - boneless. MysoreCanon said she'd watch us eat or die trying to. So I ordered a thunder chicken (no idea what is was), and the waiter told us it was a good choice. I liked the chicken that came (although I'm sure it'd have tasted better with the gravy as our waiter had suggested, instead of dry as VP asked for), while VP, being VP, said he didn't like it, and ended up wasting his share of the chicken and the rice.

Thunder chicken (left) and egg fried rice

Overall, a very satisfying meal, one where you usually leave with a smile on your face and have a good night's sleep. The bill for all this came to 740 - well worth the money spent.

Food: Superb - not just because of the quantity, but because it actually is very good.
$$$: Cheap, and for the quantity served, total value for money.
Service: Decent
Verdict: Must visit
Extra info: Parking on the main road isn't allowed, so try finding space in one of the side roads.

Delicacy, 22, 1st floor, Above Spicy Hub, Jeevan Bhima Nagar main road, Bangalore. Phone:2529 9333

4 comments:

Reuben said...

I used to visit the delicacy at Cooke town very, very regularly when I was around. I loved it, as a matter of fact, we asked them to cater for Mom and Dad's 25th Wedding anniversary.

Manohar said...

hmm.... yummy. Keep writing and sharing :)

Anonymous said...

Found a cockroach in the food.The end!
-Yet another foodie.

Karthik Shetty said...

@Anonymous with the cockroach: Too bad, I guess this would happen to someone at sometime at someplace. Don't think this is specific to Delicacy. I had a cockroach at Chungs Indiranagar...told the guy, he shrugged. Well, I shrugged too, moved it to the side of the plate, and finished my meal :)

 

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