Almost two weeks of pampering at mom's house comes to an end today... am headed back today. With all of the great food that she has been making, there were a few days when we thought of giving her a break. Those are the days we tried some interesting places in Mangalore. After several days of being absolutely carnivorous, we decided to go veg for one lunch. We headed to Chutney - vegetarian restaurant of Deepa Comforts. It was a weekend and the air conditioned enclosed section was full. We were ushered to the open air, tiled section.
This too filled up in five minutes of us being seated. The menu is vast, which is typical of restaurants in Mangalore. It had the basic cuisines of North Indian, Chinese and some south Indian thrown in as well. While there is an option of a North Indian thali meal, we opted for the South Indian version and that too the special one. The meal was really great. There was nothing restaurant-like about the preparation. Each of the items were well spiced and seasoned and you will want to polish it all of. The rest of the review is in pictures
The special south Indian thali begins with a tomato soup. This was not a watery, sorry version you normally see, but a thick and really good one. There was real cream in it and with the bread croutons was really spot on.
This is the thali when it is first placed on you. At first glance, you draw in a deep breath automatically looking at how much of food you have to eat. We opted for puris, you can choose between that and chapathis.
The Thali unveiled
For the puris you have a Dal Toi (typical of the GSB community of Mangalore). It a gravy of toor dal and spices with a generous handful of coconut slivers. The ones I have tasted have been on the watery side, even when made at home. This was a little thick along with being a bit more spicy than normal. All the same, it tasted great. There was also an aloo palak (Potato and spinach) which was nice.
The veg pulao you see in the picture above was accompanied by a really thick raita with tomatoes and onions. The pulao in itself was nice, though was surprised to find bread croutons here.
You can follow up the pulao with plain rice - boiled or raw, your choice. To go with this is a thick sambhar. While the sambhar is good, they just can't match up to the Tamil version of this dish, which is a rarity even in Bangalore, which claims to have several places that serve good sambhar. There was also rasam and a beans sukka (beans tossed in mustard and coconut).
Here you see the beans sukka, a coconut and red chilli chutney, some mango pickle.
To round up the meal, there was thick curds which was nice, without that really sour taste that most thali based curds are. The buttermilk was the spiced version. There was also a semolina and jaggery based payasam. This was followed with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream. And if all of this was not enough, we also has a sweet lime soda each.
The lime juice and the vanilla ice cream
Overall its a great meal for when you want a change. Its also reasonable at Rs 85 a thali. There are a lot of other vegetarian offerings on the menu... I tasted a channa bhatura we had as takeaway. It was really nice. The loo at this restaurant is relatively clean.
Address: Hotel Deepa Comforts, MG Road, Mangalore - 575003
Phone: 0824-2497101
Cuisine: Vegetarian Multicuisine
Cards Accepted: Yes
Wallet factor: Rs 350 for two
Parking: parking lot, but can be a wee bit difficult on weekends
3 comments