Thaligai - Traditional Brahmin Heirloom Cuisine

Thaligai thrives on heirloom cuisine, the kind of food that has passed on from traditions down the ages. There is a lot of nostalgia involved with the kind of recipes and spread which is sure to inkle a memory especially for the age old brahmin households. The food here is predominantly from down south and more so of the kind which is dished up in yesteryear Iyengar homes.

The food is sans garlic and onion and looks to go the healthy route. Thaligai as such refers to a wholesome meal fit for a feast. They have a stack of tiffin based items which you usually wouldn't eat much except on those rare festival days. Their motto is to preserve the vintage cuisine made famous by grandmothers of bygone generation in a renewed slightly tweaked format to cater to the younger crowd.

I'm not sure how exactly it'll be lapped up but the effort to bring in authentic brahmin cuisine deserves the plaudits. My feeling is that they will be more popular during seasons such as the music festival in Dec and also for the US based return folks who would be longing to consume this kind of food.

We were here on an invite to savour some of their specialities. Apart from the dining space at the ground, they have a private dining area which is well done up and seems peaceful. We had a plethora of items ranging mostly from short eat snacks to evergreen favourites and a few rice items and ended up with sweet and degree coffee.

I wouldn't go into specifics of each of the items but some of the stuff i really liked was the Morkazhi, diamond dosa, neer Kozhukattai, bhajji and bonda. The Morkazhi had a delectable taste to it as it was smudged with a flavour which was really hitting the senses. Their Mor Kulambu was also absolutely lovely. The sandwich idli was pretty different with a dash of tomato chutney spread in between the layers for it to resemble a sandwich. This was a very interesting innovation. The Neer Kozhukattai was in fact a soup, i couldn't figure this out at all. It had a lilting aroma with pieces of kozhukatta floating inside and gave a slight avial kind of taste. A real different soup which was like never before. The bonda's had a nice aloo masala tinge and the mysore one was soft and fluffy. The ladies finger bhajji was also crispy and great to munch. The diamond dosa had a slightly spicy masala inset which I quite liked. And for enders we had a jaw dropping delicious Ashok Halwa which was simply melt in the mouth and final flourish was a resoundingly strong filter coffee.

On the whole, it was a lovely experience. The food was great and homely. It was a bit mild and more catering to the healthy side which may not please everyone but once in a way it's a nice option to try out. The prices are pretty reasonable. Thaligai will have it's legion of fans. I appreciate the fact that they are taking the efforts to preserve tradition by bringing in the lost wonders of Brahmin cuisine. They are also intent on adding twists along the way for that 'x factor' and keeping their target audience lured. I wish them all the best in this endeavour and hope they find a firm footing in this ever growing food circle of Chennai.

Fromage - A cheese friendly affair!

Fromage pronounced as "Fraw-mazh" is the French equivalent of cheese. It's apparent from the name that the ever loved delicacy 'cheese' forms the significant part of the items in their menu. The restaurant is located as part of the 'Somerset' property and is a perfect addendum complementing the happening resto bar 'Radio Room' just by it's wayside.

The interiors are well played. Lovely toned blue doors adorn the settings and the white wall touch ups with meaningful portraits hung showcase the show of this place. It isn't over the top by any means and in fact gives a rosy picture with regard to the surrounding environment.

On the food, they have a menu comprising of a cuisine which has a European touch. Cheese is something which gets instills the Cheshire cat instincts within me and it was a pleasure seeing a card laid out with cheese in all it's splendour.

We were here to try a selective hand picked menu chosen for the day. We started with the soup of the day in the form of a Gouda cheddar which was quite interesting. The cheese was quite subtle but the presence of it could be felt all along.

In the starter section, we had three kinds of veg servings. We began with the delightful spinach, corn and cheddar tarts. These were sinfully cheesy and mouth wateringly mushy. The tarts were so damn soft that it was a feast biting into them with the cheesy liquid melting jocularly inside the mouth. This appetiser was gob smacking awesome. Next, we moved on to the Onion Jam Goat Cheese Rolls. This is as exotic as it gets. The combination worked wonders with the tangoing of goat cheese and caramelised onions in these golden fried rolls coming along with a lip smacking sweet tinged jam. This was another top notch appetiser. And lastly, we had the Tomato confit bruschetta with parmesan. This was a little lesser in awesomeness compared to it's predecessors but nevertheless quite good on it's own fettle. There were tomatoes galore and the shearing of parmesan cheese over crusty slices of bread was quite nice to consume.

The main course was all about Pasta's and it's brethren. The speciality of this place is the cheese wheel where pasta is made in spectacular fashion by scraping and cooking it inside those big sized oval shaped parmesan cheese wheel. The cheesiness was tingling along meltingly over the layered pieces of penne/fusili and it was quite a delight consuming them. You could feel the cheese in all it's fullest fury. Apart from the pasta, we also tried the veg Lasagne which was pretty good made in a tomato base with oodles of cheese spread along. Also was tried the Mac'n'cheese pasta. Though i found this slurpy, the salt content felt a little off.

On the whole, it was a really pleasing and satisfactory meal. You don't get to consume such high quality stuff of imported variety of cheese in many places within the city. And the quality and taste of majority of the items were resoundingly good. The service was amiable and ever ready to help us out. The rates aren't mentioned as the meet was over an invite. Even otherwise for the kind of offerings, the pricing is definitely on the competitive bracket. A shout out to Eazy Diner for hosting us and ensuring that we have an enjoyable meal. You would also like to check their application which will enable you make reservations at various top restaurant's within the country at ease via a click of a button. All in all, it was a meet full of fun and frolic with the satisfaction of a quality meal aced by Fromage.