West Delhi, with its dense population of Punjabis, has become a haven for butter chicken and dal makhni lovers. You throw a stone and it will hit a butter chicken joint. So when I got an invite from The Brewmaster, located in Moments Mall, Kirti Nagar, for a 10-day-long Lucknowi kabab food festival, I was pleasantly surprised.
At the same time I was wary. Being in love with the Awadhi cuisine, I don’t like it if something goes wrong with the recipe. But at The Brewmaster, I was lucky as most of the delicacies were made to perfection.
Tucking into a vegetarian platter, I started with the all-time-favourite Awadhi delicacy dahi ke kabab which had a nice texture as well as flavour.
The perfect crispy crust encouraged me to take two. Aatish-e-aloo stuffed with dry nuts was also good but the potatoes had gone soggy and lacked the required crispiness by the time I arrived at them.
Paneer came as a tikka in a kali mirch flavour. It was nice but would have been even better if the chef had made a kabab of the paneer and not just the normal tikkas which are available in every other restaurant.
Last in the section was the delicious palak akhrot ki tikki. The walnuts in the tikki gave it a nice crunch. And now it was time for some subtle, aromatic non-vegetarian kababs. Without any hesitation, I started with the Lucknowi trademark galaouti kababs. It was worth a try but I have tasted much better at various other places. It was followed by boti kababs which were tasty and tender, and had that perfectly balanced texture maintaining the thin line of difference between a burrah and a boti kabab. Afghani tangri was the dish I liked the most.
Succulent and juicy, it was perfectly finished in the tandoor. I ended my kabab journey with the tandoori pomfret. It is not Awadhi but who cares — it looked and tasted divine!
Meal for two: Rs.800 plus taxes
The Lucknowi Kabab Festival ends April 28
