Big Chill, New Delhi

My Last night in Delhi, and Neo, his brother Morpheus(?), and a couple of other friends of the fairer sex, both daughters of army officers (Neo himself is the son of an army officer), went out to this place called Big chill, in an area called Khan Market which supposedly has one of the highest property rates in Asia or some jazz like that...basically the real estate value is super high. So after driving from his house to the Khan Market area, we got to the restaurant only to be told we'd have to wait a while to get a table. So we pranced around the place, deciding if we should go to a different restaurant, when suddenly, Neo's phone buzzed - it was the restaurant and they had seats for us. Cool.

Big Chill reminded me of TGIF and Chili's combined together - from the way the decor is inside to the options in the menu (minus the booze), and specifically the prices - boy, one thing's for certain, we can get the same food they serve there for lesser here in Bangalore. In any case, this wasn't Bangalore, it was Delhi, so no comparing. We started with a round of milk shakes and iced teas, and shortly after that, we went in for the main course.

I had a chicken in red wine, served with fetuccine.
I must say this is one of the better chicken dishes I've had, especially since you usually eat pasta with some kind of cheesy sauce (unless you're eating spaghetti with meat sauce). One of the ladies had already had her dinner, and so she settled for a smoked chicken salad which came with sun-dried tomatoes.
It was the first time I popped just sun-dried tomato into my mouth, and along with the vinaigrette, it had a pleasant tangy taste.

Neo went in for a chicken pepper stake,
and going by the speed he got done with it, it's safe to say that he liked what he ate and didn't have anything to complain about.

Morpheus decided to skip dinner (he'd just got betrothed and I guess the realisation of it was hitting home), while the other lady in the group decided to have a fish peri-peri, which was fish in a mustard sauce.
All of agreed that the fish tasted a little too tangy for what could have been a wonderful dish.

For desserts, a Bailey's tiramisu was ordered by the peri-peri girl, and just the one spoon I took was enough to make my eyes nearly pop out - I wasn't prepared for it to be as strong as it was, so driving after eating this could be dicey.
Neo had a blueberry cheesecake, and polished it off neatly.
As for dear old me, I settled for a simple chocolate mousse, which turned out to be a little too choclatey, but when you're in the zone, these minor things usually don't matter.

For the wallet factor, well, let's put it this way - the chicken in red wine with fetuccine was almost 400 bucks, and at the end of the meal, since we split, we all paid around 500-600 each, which was slightly on the higher side, since we only had 3 main courses, a salad, 3 desserts and 5 shakes (the shakes were around the 200 mark). Let's face, I can get similar and equally good if not better food at Bangalore Bistro for less, and the service wasn't all that great either, so although the food tasted good, the price wasn't entirely justifiable.


Big Chill, 68A, Khan Market, New Delhi

Café Y

This little café tucked away off Hosur road near Bangalore Military School (on the side road near Prestige Elgin) is one of the few treasure troves of Bangalore. It so happened that the traffic around Langford Town/Shantinagar was pretty heavy, and I remembered that Café Y is supposed to be around here someplace, and so I decided to park and look for the place and hop in for an early dinner. Although this place is on a street that's pretty heavy when it comes to traffic during peak hours, it's interiors and decor and more importantly the colours used inside certainly transport you to Enid Blyton's Toyland...it's almost akin to a toy house, like Noddy's, with bright colours like yellow and orange.

The menu primarily comprises of European, especially Italian, with a good variety of choices for both vegetarians and the meat eaters. There are soups and salads, sizzlers and pastas, and a section for kiddies. They also have a separate menu card for Chinese, which I didn't try. I started off with a minestrone soup,

which was good. But the stand out feature here was the accompaniment of two pieces of bread in a basket and some small cubes of butter in a small tray covered with a lid! This was a first for me anywhere, so I was pleasantly surprised, and tucked away into the soup, and polished it off with the bread and butter.

For my main course, I didn't want to try anything meaty, and so settled for something that I thought wouldn't be too large - a veg lasagna.

Boy, was I wrong! Once the lasagna arrived and I started digging into it, not only did it taste heavenly, I also realised that there was quite a bit to finish! I had a good book with me and so I ate leisurely, while the staff were content watching Tom & Jerry as there weren't any other customers at quarter past 7. By the time I finished my lasagna, I didn't think I had any space left for dessert, but I had seen a blueberry cheesecake on the menu, and so just had to have one - so a blueberry cheesecake it was.

The portion served was large, and I don't think I've ever had a cheesecake that's tasted this good in a long time. At 100 bucks for a cheesecake, this one is well worth the money, although I'm certain I've had similar cheesecakes at cake shops for slightly less. Nevertheless, this place is really nice and perfect if you don't want to end up shelling out more than 500 bucks for a complete meal similar to what I ate. The ambiance inside is nice, and although they do have a couple of tables outside, I'm not too sure if people would fancy those at night with vehicles zipping outside the compound (but I could be wrong).

Food: Pretty good
$$$: Not very expensive - in a group, you'd shell out around 300-400 for a complete meal.
Service: Decent
Verdict: If in the area, do visit for some nice Conti food.

Café Y, 2/2, Langford Road - Eagle St intersection, Langford Town, opp. Prestige Elgin, Bangalore