Text 14664, 114 rader
Skriven 2014-07-06 21:02:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: birthday dinners 633
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Continuation of a thread started just before I was
so rudely interrupted.

We decided to treat Alissa and company to dinner to celebrate
her BSN graduation (with honors) from MGHIHP, which has
independent degree-granting privileges despite being part of
MGH, which is part of Partners, which is mostly part of
Harvard. Mercifully, she wanted Indian food, which is
relatively inexpensive.

Bob did some digging on the Internet and found Shan A Punjab,
which has been cited as one of the top new places in town
(Boston Globe and others) and is within walking distance of
Alissa's sister's place; I'd suggested Rani, which is run by
friends of Nicholas's and is even closer, but Bob was proud
of his find, so we went there.

Table for 8 in a comfy room that used to be a gas station -
the kitchen is what used to be the parts area, the bar and
half the restaurant is where the office was, and we were
seated in the former service area - you can see the garage
door still. If you ignore the gas stationness, it's a
pleasant enough space. Deb and I sat at a booth that then
had three tables for 2 pushed up to it, sort of comical,
but you do what you have to. Alissa's beau was next to me,
Bob diagonally across. The honoree, her brother and sister
and sister's fiance (who showed up late, having had work)
were at the other end out of eyeshot and shareshot.

I started us off with a couple bottles of the Trentadue
Old Patch 2012, a mostly Zinfandel blend from California
and just the sort of juice that junior sophisticates would
be inclined to go for. It was a hit and not too costly,
with overripe fruit and quite a bit of spice to go with
Indian food.

It's a fairly whitebread crowd, and there was at least lip
service to the each person order one thing custom. Tom and
I went against the grain by agreeing on two sharesies,
lamb vindaloo spicy and dal makhni extra spicy, as we were
the only hotheads in the bunch.

Deb ordered vegetable biryani against my advice; Bob got
tandoori shrimp.

Lots of naan, plain and garlic, around the table; I ordered,
of all things, roti (rather like naan but whole wheat).

A couple plates of complementary appetizers came out. These
were what I'd call "nothing pakoras," batter that should
have vegetables in it drizzled funnel-cake style into hot
oil and fried crisp. There probably is a proper name for
this dish, but I'd never order it and would overlook it on
a menu. It fulfills the salty and crunchy urge and would
go well with beer, and that's about all I can say.

Also pappadums with the usual trio of onion chutney, which
Tom and I pounced on, raita, and coriander sauce, which
Deb pronounced too spicy.

The mains were decent, nothing special, but came in indecent
portions. You know most Indian restaurants give you maybe
a cup and half of your food in a little metal dish, and with
sufficient rice this becomes a satisfying meal. We got ours
in elegant white swan-shaped bowls that held over a pint
each, i.e. close to twice what a sensible restaurant would
offer. We ended up packing up quite a bit and sending it
back with the various offspring.

Lamb vindaloo was best, though heavily tomatoed and not
nearly so vinegary as I think it should be. The spiciness
here and in my dal was supplied by plain old cayenne, a
tablespoon or so in the lamb and two or so in mine.

There were two problems with the dal. One, it had not been
salted sufficiently (it is said that if you salt the lentils
before cooking, they get tough, but I say, bring it on); and
two, it had been cooked with burned onions and garlic (it is
okay, nay, encouraged, to cook these ahead of time to make
them sweet and caramelly, but they'd really overdone it here
- probably used up their old burned onions on the theory that
we'd not be able to taste). It was the worst dal makhni that
I have ever had, but that doesn't mean it was bad, just sort
of eh. But hot.

The basmati came in another enormous tureen and was in fact
very good.

The shrimp were the most expensive thing on the menu but
just an adequate helping, smaller than ours by far. Bob
offered me one, but feeling sorry for him (he's well over
six feet and looks like an undernourished farmboy) I refused.

Biryani is generally a terrible thing to order at a restaurant,
because it's a throwaway dish. You take some old rice, toss in
some spices, and find whatever is about to go bad and add that.
In this dish the rice was perfectly fine, but ours tasted
better, not being screwed around with; the spices were ground
(acceptable but less interesting than whole) and untoasted
(unacceptable); and the vegetables looked like and may in part
have been frozen succotash. A few bits of chopped cashews
completed the feast. A lot of this went back with the kids.
I was so disturbed by this that I made a vegetable biryani a
couple days later back at home. It was ever so much better.

I'd have liked to recommend the place, as the help were most
willing, but unless the cook goes to reeducation camp along
with the one who made the chicken at the library, I won't be
back any time soon.


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