Top 4 Food Apps We Love !

- Radhika Nandwani, Contributing Author

Evernote Food 2.0 – your culinary travel companion

How often is it that you’re travelling and go out to taste the local cuisine? Atleast for me, that’s often the case. For example, I was recently in Mumbai and had heard so much about the sea food served at Mahesh Lunch Home that I had to go and pay it a visit. Now, considering that a friend of mine ditched me at the last minute, I spent quite some alone time with the fish, prawns and lobsters I gorged on.

Only that, now I want to boast about the spectacular food to my friends, but have nothing to show for it. But wait a minute, that’s where Evernote Food 2.0 comes in handy. You can save all your favorite food and meals in it, and park it this virtual foodie memory of yours forever. The app, Evernote Food 2.0, not only allows you to save all the food and meals you love, but also search for recipes and take down recipes too. You can also search for the restaurants and eat out places in your vicinity.

The app was tested out by popular food writer and consultant, Parul Shirazi, by taking it out for a spin at the Kingdom of Dreams. Here goes the video from the same.

Share your Evernote Food 2.0 use case and we could feature it here as well.

- Karan Bhujbal, Contributing author

4 Must Visit Restaurants in Noida

After spending 20 years in Noida and watching it grow from an abandoned to a well-populated place, I thought it would only be right if I shared my love for the city, in the form of the gastronomic delights that lie within it. Enclosed below are 4 must visit restaurants of Noida.

1.) Barbeque Nation

Last weekends’ treat at BBQ Nation would always be remembered. One because of the crazy company I had and second, because of the place itself.

The warm greeting at the entrance with a bowl of sweets makes you feel like a king or queen. Then the best part is the grill that is kept at your table. Normally we see salt and pepper bottles or sauces kept on the table but BBQ Nation is different, they have all kinds of oils kept on table with BBQ brushes.

Talking about food, the starters are amazing and filling. Specially the vegetarian food served there is fabulous and so up to the mark. From veg kebabs, grilled potatoes, fried corns to tikkas; it’s a delightful place for vegetarians. For people like me, who’re hard core non-vegetarians, chicken drumsticks were good, and prawns and fish were too good to be true.

The main course was not as good, but the desserts compensated that. The rabri and firni grabbed my attention at first as both were served in small matkis, but taste wise, I loved the Gulab Jamun and ice cream.

 In conclusion, it is a good place, with good food, remarkable service and warm ambience.

Last but not the least, the amazing thing that we noticed was their ‘NO TIP TAKING POLICY’! How cool…J           

2.) Fortune Cookies

One of the oldest and most authentic places in NOIDA that serves Chinese food is Fortune Cookies.

Located in Sector 18, this restaurant is one of my favorite Chinese restaurants and really shows that ‘Old is Gold’. The red and black theme, with chinese craft work and lots of gold embellishments, give the feel of mini CHINA.  

All those who crave for authentic Chinese with minimal salt and perfect flavor, this is the place to be. The golden fried prawns, garlic chicken and chinese vegetables in Cashewnut gravy are just too delicious and appetizing. Though the food is a bit expensive, the quantity is good enough to balance it out. The service is the best part of this place, as no matter how crowded, you would be served without any delays.

One can surely trust this place when you are extremely hungry and just want to hog. Not to forget the interesting end, the Fortune cookies. Crack open those little cookies and read your fortune!

3.) Kaffiiaa

One of the places where I’ve spent most of my college days, hanging out with friends, is Kaffiiaa. The Italian restaurant in Sector 18 market has a lot of good memories associated with it. Its Pastas, Bruschetta’s, salads and even shakes, are good and delightful. It’s also one of the places that serves Hookah in Noida.

The ambience is very similar to the popular Big Chill, with Old Hollywood movie posters adorning the wall and comfortable red couches adding funkiness to the place. It is a place where you will find all age groups of people, from school kids to Amitians to corporate staff. It is one of the most happening places situated in the center of the market. So, all the Hookah lovers in Noida this is the place to visit if you haven’t.

4.) Karims

As I introduced myself earlier, am a hard core non-vergetarian. Now I’ve always wanted to go to Jama Masjid and try the alluring kebabs and chicken biryani. But no problem guys, my smart dad found a solution to this – Karims!

The KARIMS in Noida is the place to be if you like to eat well cooked, rich Mughlai food and never got a chance to visit Jama Masjid for Mughlai food. This outlet in Noida brings out the best of Mughlai food and the taste is exactly similar to its Jama Masjid outlet (As my Dad says).

Personally I Loved the Chicken Biryani and Kebabs. But it has more than just starters; the menu is filled with variety of chicken and mutton dishes. In vegetarian, Makhani Daal is a must try.

Tell us about your favorite places to eat in Noida?

- Mriga Arora, Contributing author 

The Ultimate Foodie Quiz – test your food IQ!

Time and again a quick check on your food IQ is not a bad thing and that’s exactly what was done at the Saffola Masala Oats ‘The Other Side’ meet up. In an earlier post we revealed the exact flow of events that occurred on the day, but among all other interesting things, the foodie quiz was something we wanted to give special focus on, by means of this post.

A bunch of questions were asked to the 40+ group of food bloggers, all experts in their field and not many knew the answers, which showed the level of questions that were asked. Having said that, here go the same questions for you, to judge for yourselves how big a foodie you really are!

1.      The name Beefsteak is given to two ingredients, one is made of beef which is the other one?

(a) Tomato

(b) Onion

(c) Cauliflower

2.      What is that one thing that makes you go red when you eat carrots?

(a)    Carotene

(b)   The fibre

3.      Which is the best vegetable source of naturally occurring sodium

(a)    Apricot

(b) Celery

(c) Sun dried tomatoes

4.      In 1995, which plants were taken into space with the space shuttle Columbia. This marked the first time any food was ever grown in space. Which plant was it?

(a)    Bananas

(b)   Apples

(c)    Potato plant

5.      Which is that one fruit which is more proficient at waking you up in the morning than coffee?

(a)    Apple

(b)   Grapes

(c)    Peach

6.      What is a Spanish Tortilla?

(a)    It’s a Spanish version of the commonly found chips

(b)   It’s a basic Spanish omlette        

(c)    There’s nothing called a Spanish Tortilla

7.      Which edible thing is an ingredient in dynamite?

(a)    Peanuts

(b)   Salt

(c)    Sugar

8.      How many honeybees does it take to produce one tablespoon of honey?

(a)    12

(b)   24

(c)    48

9.      Which is the only fruit which has its seeds on its outer skin?

(a)    Strawberries

(b)   Oranges

(c)    Blueberry

10.  Which was the first fruit eaten on the moon?

(a)    Pear

(b)   Peach

(c)    Banana

ANSWERS:

1(a), 2(a), 3(b), 4(c), 5(a), 6(b), 7(a), 8(a), 9(a), 10(b)

Now tell us honestly how many you got right?

- Compiled by Amit Roy and Karan Bhujbal

Mistral Grill – a must visit South Delhi restaurant

We’re so fascinated with the Olive’s, Mamagoto’s and Smoke House Deli’s of Delhi, that we very often miss out on some gems in the market; Mistral Grill is one of those for us. One afternoon a couple of weeks ago, we very quietly received a mail inviting us to review the restaurant that actually made us take notice of Mistral Grill. We searched for information online, saw pictures and realized that the place looked decent, only why did we not know of the place; we’re foodies! That made us suspicious, that maybe it wasn’t popular because of some odd reason. Anyways, a couple of weeks passed and we did make it to the restaurant. Here goes the complete review.

First impressions

Getting up to the 2^nd floor of Ambience mall in Vasant Kunj, it took us a couple of minutes to spot the restaurant. Unlike an Underdoggs, it didn’t have any prominent branding in the mall, so as to reiterate its presence. But then we saw it at a corner behind Chili’s and adjacent to PVR Directors Cut. Actually getting past Chili’s was tuff, because we know the delights Chili’s can serve.

Ambience

We stepped into the restaurant and the place was as gorgeous as the pictures on the web made it out to be. It seemed very formal too; the kind that’ll require you to come in closed shoes and collared shirts (akin to Kylin at the other corner of the mall); but it wasn’t the case. The restaurant seating is L-shaped. It has a lot of seating capacity; easily can fit 80 people. The seating options were varied too. There were tall bar stool sized seats with round tables; there were well cushioned red sofas, rotating smaller sized purple sofas for 2 people and then regular leveled seating too.

The yellow lighting and wooden flooring gave it a very 5 star hotel coffee shop kind of a feel. The 2 level wine-cellars looked impressive. The separate sections where Indian and Italian are cooked revealed the attention to detail that the restaurant management had.

Food

Food has always been and will continue to be the make or break of your food experience. While at the restaurant, looking at everything that was great we were anticipating the food to be a downer, but even here we were proved so wrong.

For starters, there was a complimentary serving of white bread with a garlic dip and white vens sauce.

In main course we ordered a chicken and cheese burger. This contained a grilled chicken thigh with cheese, bacon, tomatoes and tartar sauce. The burger buns were soft, yet didn’t crumble. The chicken patty with bacon was meaty and quite a mouthful. The tomatoes were a great partition between the buns and the patty, as it helped the burger be juicy.

Next in line was the ‘Venezian’ wood oven pizza. It had mozzarella, red onions, capers, kalamata olives and pine kernals. It was crisp and tasty. The red onions were a magic ingredient because they consistently gave that sweet caramelized taste, which works well for me.

We finished main course with cream and cheese fettuccini with sautéed pancetta, fresh parsley, french cream and pecorino cheese sauce. This was a very simple dish, well made and if you’re having a hard time selecting what to go for, this is a very good choice.

In dessert we tried the granny smith apple and blueberry crumble with vanilla ice-cream and sugar free. The taste was lip smacking again. However, despite having a sweet tooth, it was a wee bit sweeter than what it should have been.

A major point to highlight was that the portion size of all dishes was great. It was actually refreshing to see this.

Price

The place is very reasonably priced, in comparison to other fine dining restaurants. With all that was ordered above, we could say the average price for a meal for 2 (without drinks) would be approx. 1200.

Conclusion

It was a delight to have visited Mistral Grill and we’re sure to return soon. 1 visit put all our apprehensions to rest. The ambience, food, service and price, have just one thing written all over it – it’s a must visit restaurant in South Delhi.

- Karan Bhujbal, contributing author

The healthy and tasty Saffola Masala Oats ‘The Other Side’ event

There are events which are good, there are events which are great and then there are events which are GRAND! Saffola Masala Oats presented ‘The Other Side’ of healthy food to us and the event was grand- not because of the sheer number of attendees or the aura of the celebrity chef (the Michelin starred Vikas Khanna), but more so because of the cause - Giving the healthy food, a dash of Masala and a whole lot of twist and taste.

The Saffola Masala Oats ‘The Other Side’ began with a regular e-mailer invite. But what followed, was a super-innovative super-surprise! Who could have imagined that the prelude to a ‘delicious’ day would have made out of a couple of brinjals, a Tinda (Apple Gourd) and a Karela (Bitter-gourd) put up in a nice and bringht yellow box. But the best was yet to come.

Came the Judgement day!

The event kick-started on a high with Samyukta, the host for the day and THE Vikas Khanna taking the centre stage with their funny one-liners and a promise for a delicious day ahead. What amazed and amused the gathering the most was the more than just a ‘touch’ of Desipan in the star chef. He is, as it seemed very evident, a true ‘Ambrsariya’ and it showed. Amidst the flourishing career in the States, he has managed to keep the desipan intact and it was indeed a spectacle to see him display every bit of it. From the choice of cooking ingredients to his quick anecdotes from his mother, India was written all over him.

The Philips induction cookers went off on the stage as Chef Vikas stirred and tossed his magic in the tinda and made ‘The Gourd of small things’ out of the boring and bland vegetable. A superb display of how healthy can be made tasty, and easily so!

What followed was nothing less than a back-to-school experience. Chef Vikas turned to a quiz master and asked 6 interesting questions to the audience, only to hand-pick 6 contestants for the contest that followed. The challenge was given out in a single statement, “make a dish out of the bland and boring vegetables, and make it tasty.”

It was really a great experience to witness the spacious and spunky place be full of smoke and smell of sheer delicacy. Ekta Khaitan was the lady of the hour as she cooked her way to glory making the bestg dish in the first round. It was indeed heartening for a foodie to see all the glorious dishes being made out of what we generally consider “Yuck!”

Another round of cooking by Chef Khanna, but this time it was ‘crostini with peppy tomato’; a simple-as-hell recipe involving majorly just bread and Saffola Masala Oats. One of those dishes which would save you from all the tiring cooking if a bunch of kids decide to drop by.

A similar module was followed again. The quiz, the contestants and the cooking! This time the ingredient was Saffola Masala oats and it was nothing less than eye-popping to see Koftas, upmas and pizza bases being made of the oats. 

As the event came to a close, we had one final jump of joy. A basket-full (literally) of Saffola Masala Oats and the Khanna-Sutra (Chef Vikas Khanna’s recipe book) was distributed to all attendees.

It was nice to see bloggers giving a good feedback on the event:   





Indeed a delightful day for a foodie. Thank You Saffola Masala Oats!


- Amit Roy, Contributing Author

*Disclaimer: FOODATHON partnered with Saffola for organizing this event. 

Participate in the #SaffolaMasalaOats Twitter contest now!

Health or taste, sometimes you may sway to one side and sometimes to the other! There may even be cases where you may yearn to gain both. With that in mind, Saffola Masala Oats, a meal filled with wholesome, lip smacking goodness, invites the twittersphere to share their perspective on ‘Health ya taste, which side do you sway most of the time?’

All tweets need to be accompanied with #SaffolaMasalaOats and the contest lasts only for today; so HURRY!

For any queries on the contest, please drop a line in the comments stream below.

All the best!