It’s funny how accidental food encounters turn out to be quite amazing. On our way to Pollachi, we felt the first pangs of hunger and after several calls to our friends there, we decided to eat at the recently opened Thamilar restaurant on the Pollachi-Coimbatore highway.
It was clean with simple white-washed walls and a thatched roof that made the intense heat bearable. A small rekhla positioned at the entrance adds to the charm of this eatery specialising in Tamil village cuisine.
The lunch menu comprises of mostly rice with different meat accompaniments. The tiffin varieties like idli, dosa and parotta are served usually for dinner. However, seeing that we were enthusiastic foodies, they offered to serve us kari dosai and chappathis for lunch along with what they called bai veetu biryani.
The soft chappathis went well with the aromatic chicken gravy. I never thought I could enjoy hot gravy in the midst of summer but there’s something so comforting about a typical nattu kozhi kozhambhu. You can taste the intense flavours of chilli, garlic, coriander, onion but they are not overpowering.
There were four kinds of biryani — chicken, mutton, egg and plain. We chose the plain biriyani. It turned out to be a mutton biryani without the mutton pieces! It was served with a vibrant green pudina chutney, onion thayir pachadi and a thick brown gravy, again meatless. None of us had ever eaten a biriyani with a pudina chutney before!
A South Indian Muslim biryani is usually accompanied by a watery brinjal gravy called dhalcha. However, as the owners felt that it may not suit everyone’s palates, they serve it only on special request.
After tasting the biryani-chutney combination, I felt I had been doing a disservice to the biryani by serving it without the chutney.
Having enjoyed a meal so completely, my companions and I had a Rocky-and-Mayur moment. I decided to find out more about the place. Brothers Ajmal and Rafeeq own it. The latter is a passionate foodie and believes in living an organic lifestyle. Their recipes are traditional family recipes that have been handed down over the years; hence the name bai veetu biryani. They own a small plot where they grow vegetables along with herbs like coriander and curry leaves. They use only goat manure to enrich the soil.
The chickens too are free-range with the chicken weighing not more than three kg and a rooster about five kg. Ajmal says that some customers complain that the chicken is not meaty enough but they don’t want to serve the broiler variety. They use only cold-pressed oils from neighbouring farms and all the dry masalas are ground at home.
On Sundays, they have a special selection: pigeon, partridge, laapa (stuffed parota) are reserved for the weekend. Ajmal also serves ice cream but only because he doesn’t like to see his customers disappointed. The wry expressions and glum faces have forced him to stock up on ice cream. But he makes sure to hide the bottles of aerated drinks behind the cash counter. It comes out only when a diner is very insistent!
These gents who are in the textile and coir business have opened this space to showcase their home cooking in a manner that sustains farms and contributes to good health.
Food For Thought
Location: Coimbatore-Pollachi highway, Aachipatti, Opposite Bharath Vidya Niketan School
Contact: Prabhu 9688222233 or Saranath 9865705413
Meal for 2: Rs.400 (with mineral water); Non-veg biryani @ Rs.140 per plate and veg meals @ Rs.70.