There are so many long holiday weekends this year and I already have things planned out for most of them. But when it came to this particular one (the Jan 26th one), we had to shelve most of our plans for several reasons. Not one to give up that easily, I had this one holiday well planned out - Get as early as possible to the Lalbagh Flower show and then head out to the Butterfly Park at Bannerghatta road with a nice lunch in between. The Lalbagh Flower show, at least what I got to see of it considering the crowd was like someone had told the Bangalorean population gold was being handed for free, was really nice. But we saw half and got out before we got squashed. Next we headed to Bannerghatta road, but half hour of not making any head way in senseless traffic and we just hightailed it back. I needed to pick up some stuff for junior and we headed to Central Mall in JP Nagar. As luck would have it I did not get what I was looking for. As we were leaving, happened to notice this ad painted on the lift - "The Village, Yeh Ek Restaurant Nahin, Ek Anubhav hai" - Its not a Restaurant its a experience". Since we were there and its was lunch time, we decided to head there. And so all the way to the 6th floor we went.

Now for the food experience. As you enter, you have these guys dressed as chaiwallahs carrying little steel glasses of jal jeera and shikanji in those metal tea carriers. You can take as many glasses as you like. Next a chap dressed as an inmate of Central Jail (which later features as an important part of your meal) comes around with an old time kettle filled with hot tomato soup. The Shikanji and Jal Jeera were ice cold and great and the soup was so-so. We took in a bit of the movie at Imperial Talkies while we sipped on these.

Next you can head to the Chaniya Maniya counter and gorge on all sorts of chaats. There was a shouting match going on between the Theka (where ice golas were being made) and this counter. Each was yelling out typical hawker style to get more people to their corner. It took me a few minutes to figure out that it was the same guy with the gun throat heading from one counter to another and creating the ruckus. But good fun it was! We missed it at the beginning, but opposite the GoShaala is the paani puri guy and you should have some from there if you like tangy, spicy, aloo filled puris on your little plates.


The food is a mix of Rajasthani, Gujrati, Marwari, Punjabi and some South Indian thrown in for good measure. And so, there is a push cart serving a variety of farsaan. Lot of crispy savories and junior came back quite often. All the mains were served at "Hungry Eyes Chowmein Center". From what I can remember - dum aloo, paneer in a thick cream based gravy, Sarson da Saag, two kinds of dals, a moong dal pulao, rasam vada, white rice, sambar, mango kadhi, dal kichdi, pav bhaji and jalebis made hot of the fire. Tried most of it and liked what I ate. What particularly stood out was the mango kadhi, the moong dal pulao and the sarson da saag.





We sat close to the theka in the Billu Barber section. Do not miss the truck wheels put up with those tacky oneliners you see on trucks. Now while seated here, one of the chaps was roaming around with this bucket filled with fake (or not) Carlsberg beer bottles filled with chaas (buttermilk). I called him over and had 3 three glasses of that cold yumciousness. Got a scratchy throat today though!





By now we were pretty stuffed and simply walking around - I got my palm read for Rs 51 and thoroughly enjoyed an impromptu Bhangda show by this big group of guys who came in and made the punctured autorickshaw cum seating table their adda. And through it all came this guy on cycle selling "garama garam chai".



Phone:9663294243
Cuisine: North Indian, buffet, bit of South Indian too 
Wallet factor: Rs 750 for two