Karavalli

One of my coworkers goes to Karavalli once a week.  Some people might find this mundane and redundant, but let me be clear: he often switches it up by alternately visiting the Saratoga location and then back to Latham, closer to where we live. 

I really can't blame him.  It's just so good.  The portions are enormous, you feed yourself and then some with leftovers to bring back the good memories at a later date, and the service is prompt and friendly.  The place is always busy, humming with a good energy that just makes you feel glad.  Maybe it's the blue "sky"?

If you've been around a while, you know we love Indian.  Upscale modern Indian from Rasika, cheap takeout from Delhi Dhaba, sit-down traditional from Delhi Club, or crazy colors pizzazz at Tandoori Nights.  We haven't met much Indian cuisine that we don't like, but we had high hopes at our new digs.  And the menu had some items we'd never seen before--apps go well beyond the typical samosas and pakoras.  Let's discuss below.

Mmm giant beer + buttery naan.  J's pale hand cannot wait to spoon some palak.

Above you'll find Bhel Poori, a typical chaat or snack.  Rice puffs, chopped onion, potato, coriander leaves, and tamarind. It's odd how they left out how it's made with crack, but clearly there's an addictive substance in it.  I shovel it first to my plate, then quickly (really, before it really arrives) into my mouth as if a famine is going to set in at any moment.  I'm like Katniss when she first leaves District 12--insatiable, despite the bounty before me.  

Crispy tamarind eggplant with a similar flavor profile to the bhel poori, but with yogurt, too. 

Lamb korma.  Delightful, but not as favorite in my heart as the apps.

A rock solid palak paneer.  The tandoori chicken was also a delight.  Seriously, one appetizer + two entrees + naan and you'll still have leftovers.  Which means if you're us and you get two apps + two entrees + naan you won't have to cook dinner the next day, which is nice.

Our current obsessions with Karavalli and Ala Shanghai (rainbow shredded chicken WHAT'S UP) make me super meh about going to a random Italian or new Americanish place on our hypothetical list.  Why pay $20ish per entree for something that might be good when I can have 6 soup dumplings for $4, and delicious entrees with guaranteed fab flavors (and leftovers) for $10-12?  Recently it's been Vietnamese, Indian, Thai, Chinese, repeat.  It kinda makes me want to move to Latham.

Karavalli
9B Johnson Road
Latham, NY  (add'l locations in Saratoga)

Fojol Bros. of Merlindia - Insights from Guest Blogger LB!

[Note: I know, more food from trucks?  Even though I don't work downtown, I don't want to keep you all from being informed about your options on wheels here in the District.  Below, the fabulous and generous LB guest blogged her recent food truck experience. Thanks, LB!!!! And thanks to Fojol Bros. Twitter Page for the picture.]

If you're anything like me, then deciding what to eat for lunch is the most difficult decision of your day.  No later than 12:01 p.m., M-F, the emails start filling up your Outlook inbox, asking about your lunch thoughts, or, if the time is getting late, offering up a hunger-themed haiku (or does that just happen at my office?).

Then the negotiations commence: "Not again--we just ate there last week!"; "The weather isn't cold enough yet for soup"; "I am so sick of sandwiches." ; "That place is too far to walk in this rain." "I am not paying 9 dollars for another crappy salad!"

Today's decision was made remarkably easy by the arrival of the Fojol Bros. of Merlindia, a self-described "Traveling Culinary Carnival."  That description is fairly accurate, if your impression of a carnival involves being served curry from costumed, mustached men in a food truck while your body involuntarily moves to the catchy music blaring from the speakers.

They have three size options: a "dingo" (one pick--$2), a "meal" (two picks--$6) or a "feast" (three picks--$9).  You make your picks from a rotating selection of offerings, and each includes basmati rice.  Today's meat options were curry chicken and chicken masala, and the vegetarian options were lentils and chickpeas.  I opted for an all-veggie meal of lentils and chickpeas, and one of the Fojol brothers said my mother would be proud.  

I'm no expert on Indian food, but I did spend three months in London, which makes me sufficiently credentialed.  The chickpeas were my favorite--great texture and flavor.  The lentils were a little mushy, but once I mixed them into the rice, I didn't notice the mushiness anymore.  However, I do like my Indian food spicy, and this meal was on the mild side--it could have used more heat. I also missed naan, but I guess that's too hard to prepare from a truck. Overall, though, it was a solid meal--one option I'll definitely suggest again, when next Tuesday's lunch negotiations begin.

Fojol Bros.

Location: changes daily

http://twitter.com/fojolbros

Postcard from NYC

[Yep, Shellyn wasn't a huge fan of my camera-usage in or near eateries, so here is a Google map street-view original, complete with blurry dude.]

My friend Shel lives on what she (and others?) call Curry Row. Raj Mahal, Calcutta, Taj Mahal, Spice Cave, etc—the line of Indian restaurants and the proprietors standing outside to convince to come in remind me of the narrow alleys in Brussels. Menus look the same and you can’t tell from the outside if one is better than another.

We chose Raj Mahal because of the friendly guys standing on the street, and I think our pick was top notch. She’s vegetarian, and because I <3 vegetarian food, we shared two entrees and some garlic naan. I love the beghum bartha (I see it sometimes as beigan bartha or some other spelling incarnation at other restaurants); it’s eggplant based, and at Raj Mahal it was so nice—a little sweet, and very light. I’ve had it spicy, I’ve had it a little salty, but this was my favorite version. We also got a spinach and chickpea dish, chana saag. I thought about pallak paneer (spinach with cubes of cheese), but it can be sort of creamy and heavy, and we were planning our dessert from the start. Plan ahead and ye shall watch what you eat. I loved both dishes and would go back and get the exact same ones. The garlic naan was ok—not the best naan I’ve ever had, but it was fine. We drank water, got two vegetarian dishes, one order of naan, and there were some fun sauces on the table (albeit mostly too spicy for me). Shel got herself a side of hot sauce so she could free herself from the constraints of my mild-loving tastebuds. We didn’t even clean the serving dishes clean (we had a bit leftover), we each got a complimentary scoop of mango sorbet at the finale, and we did it all for $23. In New York City. ::pats self on the back:: Raj Mahal
E. 6th St (Between 1st and 2nd Avenues)
NY, NY

We had room for dessert after taking a stroll to 16 Handles.

AND THEN we went to 16 Handles. Yes, another yogurt place. I know, enough with the yogurt already, but this place is different, I swear. 16 Handles is for people who want to get what they want in the amount that they want with whatever they want on top of it. There are 16 flavors (obviously) of non-fat fro-yo and you pay by the weight. Get as little or as much as you want. Toppings are decadent (cookie dough pieces, tiny brownie pieces), funky (mochi), and fruity (blueberries, kiwi, strawberries, mandarin oranges, etc).

With so many flavors to choose from, I decided to forego all the fruit ones and also the original plain tangy. I had pistachio, mint, chocolate, peanut butter, coffee, and I think cookies & cream. I topped it with almonds and blueberries. I thought about coconut, but decided to save that for a day when I would make a “normal” cup. Maybe I’d go back one day and have peanut butter yogurt with nuts and coconut. But not this day. On this day it was totally necessary for me to have a zillion flavors.

I thought it was going to be unbelievably expensive, but trying all those flavors and having a fairly sizable portion didn't cost me anymore than cobbler & custard at DG.

As all the young folks gathered and hung out on the street with their crazy yogurts, the Tasti D-lite across the street looked so sad and empty. For now, anyway.

16 Handles
E. 10th St & 2nd Ave
NY, NY

Rasika

Remember the foodies? They were PSYCHED about Rasika. Our recent visit was very much like the first. Lots of oohs and ahhs, and classic one-liners that attempted to describe what it was we were tasting.

First, we all LOVED the wine J picked, a supersmooth Australian Shiraz. And we appreciate the diversity of the wine list (geographically and dolla-billz-wise).


We shared the palak chaat and ragda patties as appetizers--even though we'd had the palak chaat before, it was too good and funky to not share with these foodies.

We also tried the tawa baingan, a stacked eggplant/potato creation with peanut sauce. SO GOOD. We didn't realize it would be stacked up like blocks, and were imagining something mushier, more along the lines of baingan bartha.


For dinner we shared tandoori chicken tikka that was falling apart with tender goodness. Our vegetarian dish (and you should get one) was with butternut squash--it's not on the online menu right now, but it was awesome. It had a little bit of heat (not too much for my mild-loving buds), and F described it (to M's dismay) as "if butternut squash went on an African safari and contracted an exotic disease--in a good way." What she means is this: when you look at it, you think sweet mash of squash. You get something more interesting. Hence, "exotic disease."



Our lamb dish (the lamb rizala, with the funky gold leaf) was my favorite. The texture of the lamb was awesome--it wasn't a mush, but it wasn't tough or gamey. And the color contrast between the lamb and the sauce (when you cut it open) was as it should be, but often isn't elsewhere (as in, other restaurants, not other Rasika dishes). The sauce was so good that I consistently drowned my rice in it and savored each soaked bite like it was a decadent dessert.



Besides that, we shared a bread basket and some basmati rice. My overall impression this time around was GO WITH FRIENDS. You get to try more stuff. I know this is pretty much always true, but with a sharey or small-plate situation my enthusiasm for additional guests heightens.

I do have one complaint: the Rasika web site induces nausea. They should have a visible text-only option for customers to choose.

Scratch that, second complaint: more naan per order. I think naan (and probably) rice should be a default side situation, served family style. None of this separate ordering nonsense. Maybe someone has had a little too much takeout.

Rasika
633 D Street NW
Metro: Red/Green/Yellow Lines to Gallery Place/Chinatown

Ghar-E-Kabab

No! It's not a kabab place! Not that there's anything wrong with that...

According to an on-site sign, and declarations on the menu and web site, Ghar-E-Kabab is organic. This Indian-Nepalese eatery is relatively new to downtown Silver Spring, an area with no shortage of restaurants.

Dishes are served in the same tiny copper bowls as this place Jordaan in Amsterdam, where I ate possibly THE BEST Indian food ever. J was there, he can attest.

For dinner we all shared chicken vindaloo (avoided--too spicy for me), lamb curry, chicken saag, and aloo ghobi (potatoes and cauliflower), and paratha (of which we wish there were more). The texture of the lamb was great--lamb is tricky, sometimes it's kind of chewy, but not here. The chicken saag was especially yum, I love saag (spinach) in a serious way. We started with samosas (2 in an order), and great tiny round pakoras--one order came with 4-6ish, so they were very shareable. Taj Mahal beer delighted half of the table, and I recommend trying it on your next visit.

None of us were feeling particularly gluttonous, but if we were we would have went for a thali, a platter that comes with small servings of just about everything. If you're sharing and want all the things on the thali, you can probably get a greater variety-bang-for-the-buck.

Service was commendable. Our waters were re-filled often, and although the place was packed when we arrived, we were told we would be seated in just 5 minutes--and we were.

For a local ethnic eatery, they have an awesome web site.

I don't recommend Ghar-E-Kabab for ECH or BLC, who, after returning from Bangalore, have sworn off all Indian food (possibly forever).

Ghar-E-Kabab
944 Wayne Avenue
Silver Spring, MD
Metro: Red Line to Silver Spring

Rasika

Do you love Indian food? Are you hungry right now? Stop reading, go to Chinatown, eat at Rasika, and then come back and read the rest of my nonsense later.

...

Welcome back! Isn't it gorgeous inside? At our recent trip to this modern twist on the never-boring (to me) Indian restaurant, J and I started with the Asparagus Uttapam. Uttapam has a pancake shape and texture, and usually the ingredients (like asparagus) are cooked right into the batter. It was fun to try, but next time I'd probably get something different with more flavor. Next was the Palak Chaat. Don't worry if you forget to write it down, I think the servers are trained to recommend it. It's basically flash fried spinach mixed with tamarind, sweet date chutney, and yogurt. It tastes similar to but better than french fries, and spinach definitely counts more as a "vegetable" than potatoes.

It turns out I wasn't man enough to take the spice on the Chicken Green Masala--without the heat it would have had a real cool, fresh taste from the mint that I would have enjoyed. That doesn't usually happen, but neither does the next part. My FAVORITE entree was the Lamb Dhansak, made with Dhansak masala, pumpkin, dill, and lentils. Dhansak masala is made with every spice and herb under the sun, along with ginger, garlic, and lentils--it just tasted like super good sauce, to me. The dishes were complemented by a white rice and long grain brown rice, respectively.

There were so many delicious-sounding (and looking) sides to choose from, but we went with the Palak Aloo Kofta (spinach, potato, fenugreek, and cumin). We were both pretty psyched that the potato mixture was sort of in a low mound hiding in the spinach, as opposed to being dispersed throughout the bowl. It was very flavorful, but next time I'd like to try something more daring--overall the vegetables are pretty tame, though. Maybe something with coconut next time. I love anything with eggplant (look for a "baigan" dish) but I had eaten too much of it during the week--effectively eggtplant-ed out.

Next time I may request that our naan come out with our main dishes--we ate it all with our appetizers and didn't have any left to soak up the delicious sauce from the lamb. We could have gotten more, I know, but how much naan must we eat?

Get dessert. If I hadn't stuffed myself at dinner I would have chosen the date and toffee pudding. I love dates. Still, I don't regret sharing the Chocolate Samosa, which was like a flaky pastry version of the savory favorite, filled with warm thick chocolate (sweet, not bitter at all). A little tricky to eat with a fork, but otherwise fantastic.

Dinner at Rasika lasted just over 2 hours for us speed-eaters, and was a perfect prelude to our movie at E Street Cinemas.

Rasika
633 D Street NW
Metro: Red, Green, or Yellow line to Gallery Place/Chinatown