[Continued from Part I]
From Tipu Sultan's tomb, we went straight to Mysore. Mr David's friend and mentor Prof Chandy had invited us to stay over at his house. Unfortunately he himself was out of town at that time, something he expressed much regret over. His general factotum Peter took every care to see we had a comfortable time. After a quick wash-up we headed out to see the Mysore Palace all lit up for the occasion. We first viewed it from a vantage-point halfway up the Chamundi Hills. The vista was truly stunning, but I was unable to do justice to it photographically as I had left my zoom lens behind in Bangalore. We then proceeded to the palace itself, to see the decorations close up. Very pretty it was too. But let's face it, there's only so many times you can stare at a bunch of lightbulbs: you've seen one you've seen them all. We spent half an hour or so there, took lots of pictures, then pushed over to Sree Annapoorna for a much-needed dinner.
Sree Annapoorna is one of those places whose looks alone leave you intrigued and eager for more. It is housed in a beautiful old building right next to the State Bank of Mysore head office. The interiors are equally impressive, running to high ceilings, warm tones and arches everywhere - windows, doorways, even the colonnade outside. The dining area, though, bears signs of an identity crisis. Watercolours of old Mysore vie for attention with near-naked tubelights and funny s-shaped tubes suspended from the ceiling which don't seem to serve any functional purpose, and have in all likelihood spawned out of some misbegotten designer fantasy. But this is a minor nit. A slightly bigger nit has nothing to do with the place itself, but how it's been written about. Given the circumstances I had presumed the place was both old and popular, and so bound to have loads of articles published on it. I was surprised to find all of one brief mention, in a blog run by a Canadian Mormon "senior missionary couple" (as they call themselves). And even that brief mention is interesting for quite the wrong reasons. I understand the authors are visitors from abroad, and thus entitled to some latitude when it comes to details. But even so, and especially when they've already spent some four to five months in Bangalore, a description of "igly" [sic] or "white rice pattie" served with a "spicy curry sauce" and (horrors!!) "dahi (yogurt)" does come across as startling. As Adithi points out, "coconut chatni ki dahi bana dii, literally!"
The biggest nit, gripe, whatever you call it, remains reserved for the food they served us. It was fully as
disappointing as the building was spectacular. We had ordered several
varieties of dosa - coarse-textured Rava Roast Dosa for me, Benne Dosa for some (don't recall who), regular Masala Dosa
for others. And they were all disastrous, each of them. My Rawa Roast
was overcooked and thus transited from crispy or crunchy into a state
of outright hardness. It was also singularly devoid of flavour. The
other dosas tasted sour, most likely because the batter used was so
stale it had started to ferment. The coconut chutney was thin; the
sambar was decent but nothing exceptional. Ironically, the saving grace
of the entire meal were the quasi-Chinese dishes
we had ordered as sides. The Chilli Mushroom was particularly
delectable - succulent mushrooms, chillies just piquant to make things
interesting, and overall a judicious use of spices and condiments. The
Mushroom Manchurian wasn't bad either. But nice as they were, they were
hardly enough to redeem the meal in its entirety. Which meant five very
disappointed diners at the end of proceedings. Five because Mr David
didn't feel like joining us, and said he'll pick up something for
himself on our way back to Prof Chandy's house.
This "something" eventually materialised into Biryani and Kalmi Kabab from a joint called Biryani Paradise. They took some time to process the order, time we spent chatting with the owner, an affable gentleman called Abdul Khader. I wish I could be rude to veggie fanatics and gloat over what a thumping success the stuff was. But no, no such luck. The Biryani was fully as disappointing as the Dosas had been, the Kabab better but still mediocre.
[Continued in Part III]
Read more...
From Tipu Sultan's tomb, we went straight to Mysore. Mr David's friend and mentor Prof Chandy had invited us to stay over at his house. Unfortunately he himself was out of town at that time, something he expressed much regret over. His general factotum Peter took every care to see we had a comfortable time. After a quick wash-up we headed out to see the Mysore Palace all lit up for the occasion. We first viewed it from a vantage-point halfway up the Chamundi Hills. The vista was truly stunning, but I was unable to do justice to it photographically as I had left my zoom lens behind in Bangalore. We then proceeded to the palace itself, to see the decorations close up. Very pretty it was too. But let's face it, there's only so many times you can stare at a bunch of lightbulbs: you've seen one you've seen them all. We spent half an hour or so there, took lots of pictures, then pushed over to Sree Annapoorna for a much-needed dinner.
Sree Annapoorna is one of those places whose looks alone leave you intrigued and eager for more. It is housed in a beautiful old building right next to the State Bank of Mysore head office. The interiors are equally impressive, running to high ceilings, warm tones and arches everywhere - windows, doorways, even the colonnade outside. The dining area, though, bears signs of an identity crisis. Watercolours of old Mysore vie for attention with near-naked tubelights and funny s-shaped tubes suspended from the ceiling which don't seem to serve any functional purpose, and have in all likelihood spawned out of some misbegotten designer fantasy. But this is a minor nit. A slightly bigger nit has nothing to do with the place itself, but how it's been written about. Given the circumstances I had presumed the place was both old and popular, and so bound to have loads of articles published on it. I was surprised to find all of one brief mention, in a blog run by a Canadian Mormon "senior missionary couple" (as they call themselves). And even that brief mention is interesting for quite the wrong reasons. I understand the authors are visitors from abroad, and thus entitled to some latitude when it comes to details. But even so, and especially when they've already spent some four to five months in Bangalore, a description of "igly" [sic] or "white rice pattie" served with a "spicy curry sauce" and (horrors!!) "dahi (yogurt)" does come across as startling. As Adithi points out, "coconut chatni ki dahi bana dii, literally!"
The biggest nit, gripe, whatever you call it, remains reserved for the food they served us. It was fully as
disappointing as the building was spectacular. We had ordered several
varieties of dosa - coarse-textured Rava Roast Dosa for me, Benne Dosa for some (don't recall who), regular Masala Dosa
for others. And they were all disastrous, each of them. My Rawa Roast
was overcooked and thus transited from crispy or crunchy into a state
of outright hardness. It was also singularly devoid of flavour. The
other dosas tasted sour, most likely because the batter used was so
stale it had started to ferment. The coconut chutney was thin; the
sambar was decent but nothing exceptional. Ironically, the saving grace
of the entire meal were the quasi-Chinese dishes
we had ordered as sides. The Chilli Mushroom was particularly
delectable - succulent mushrooms, chillies just piquant to make things
interesting, and overall a judicious use of spices and condiments. The
Mushroom Manchurian wasn't bad either. But nice as they were, they were
hardly enough to redeem the meal in its entirety. Which meant five very
disappointed diners at the end of proceedings. Five because Mr David
didn't feel like joining us, and said he'll pick up something for
himself on our way back to Prof Chandy's house. This "something" eventually materialised into Biryani and Kalmi Kabab from a joint called Biryani Paradise. They took some time to process the order, time we spent chatting with the owner, an affable gentleman called Abdul Khader. I wish I could be rude to veggie fanatics and gloat over what a thumping success the stuff was. But no, no such luck. The Biryani was fully as disappointing as the Dosas had been, the Kabab better but still mediocre.
[Continued in Part III]






























