Bangalore restaurant reviews
Konkan/Malnad
Mangalorean
Coastaal Express
Friday, March 09, 2012Me! In words
I worked in the Shivananda Circle area for three years and thanks to ever-obliging colleagues and PG mates discovered everything that the area and my limited budget could afford me. Of course this place wasn't around when I lived in the area, but I happened to stumble on it when looking for a place to eat after we went for a kiddie play to Chowdiah. I did get a lot of other nice suggestions - but squid / Kori Rotti and a taste of home trumped all.
Rather than get a masala papad or some such to mindless nibbles, we got onion sandige baskets. I had just finished my stock at home and these were so welcome. Anoushka hijacked the basket and batted those cute eyelashes and got us another one.
The seafood menu is exhaustive and the menu clearly mentions that you need to ask for the price of fish like Anjal, Kane, Pomfret and crab. We started with my favorite Squid Masala fry. All the red you see did not translate into fire engines clanging their way to the restaurant. The color is the magic of Kashmiri chillis and the masala distinctly the Mangalorean Meet Mirsang - vinegar, chillis, spices all ground together and then sauteed with squid rings to make what you see. Spicy yes, but in a lovely sort of way.
Squid Masala Fry
Chicken ghee roast is on the menu and its says clearly you need to wait for at least 25 minutes for it to come to the table and so we ordered it with the squid assuming it would come with the main course. But it arrived around 15 minutes later. Lots of ghee and a distinctly different masala from the squid - am assuming they left out the vinegar and toned down on the heat levels. This was a great half plate of ghee roast. But my all time favorite still is the one from Suggi's.
Chicken ghee roast
We wanted to sample as much as we could, and so went in for the Coastaal Basket which has 4 each of neer dosas, moodes, pundis and appams. The appams were brought in later. We had this with chicken pulimunchi.
Each of the items in the basket were nice, with the neer dosas being soft (again Suggi's had by far the best), the moodes and pundis were grainy and went very well the pulimunchi, which though labelled spicy was not of those napalm-the-tastebuds variety. It had a very mix balance of hot and sour tastes. Appams were nice, but any day, they are best eaten of the tava. And for the life of me I don't understand why restos can't invest in the appam kadai and get that really deep fluffy center with crispy edges to their appam. Either that or learn to get it right.
The Coastaal Basket
Appams
Chicken pulimunchi
And of course, since we were more than just the Holy Trinity of 3 of us at this meal, we ordered the Kori Rotti. Junior as usual partied on the rotti (khispy in her words). The chicken curry was great, made in the Kundapuri style, heavy on the coconut milk, right on the spices. Maybe a drizzle of freshly grated coconut before it came out would have completed the dish even more. But this was one good Kori Rotti.
Kori Curry with the Rotti below
Service is nothing fancy, but prompt. The space is clean and though from the outside you may feel you cannot take the family in, you very much can. The place serves alcohol as well and the one beer we shared went really well with the meal. The total came to around Rs 1200. The loos are clean.
Address: 6/4 Shivananda Complex, Shivananda Circle, Kumarapark East, Sheshadripuram, Bangalore
Phone: 22355094
Cuisine: Coastal
Wallet factor: Rs 1000 for two
Wallet factor: Rs 1000 for two
Parking: Nothing exclusive, look in the bylanes close by
