Jazzy spray painted ceilings, walls covered with lyrics, and a Bob Marley image made of coffee beans are some of the décor highlights that arrest the eye as soon as you step into Hangout.
Ambience, which is often an after-thought for many restaurants in the city, is one of the highlights of this new restaurant at Kesavadasapuram. Given a free reign by young restaurateur, Vivek, a group of final year students of architecture of the College of Engineering, Trivandrum, have designed something that is refreshingly youthful.
Their inventiveness is evident right from the signboard of Hangout, which has been made from discarded firewood, to lampshades made of bamboo baskets. Graffiti on the walls has many popular phrases and dialogues from popular films: lines such as ‘Shaeey!’, ‘Athenthaada ninakku kaappi kudichaalu?’ and ‘Yo Man, One tea’.
“There are not many coffee shop-cum-restaurants in this part of the city. It was my wife, Dhanya, who encouraged me to start this venture, even though we are novices in the restaurant business. Other than being a foodie, my only experience in this field is that I worked as a catering boy during my college days. I was particular that the interior design of the restaurant had to wow customers and so it took us almost a year to complete,” explains Vivek, with a smile.
Truth be told, I was half expecting the food to be as zany as the interiors of the restaurant. Boy, was I wrong! The menu boasted an extensive selection of Maldivian, Thai, Tibetan, Chinese and Indian dishes. “Our most popular dish is Patiala Chicken Biriyani but it is available only from 12 noon to 3 p.m. Our Nepalese chef, Durga, is a whiz at Tibetan cuisine and has several signature dishes on the menu,” says Vivek, when asked what he would recommend.
I started the meal with a glass of Chilli lime – definitely not a drink for the faint-hearted, followed by Tibetan Mount Everest chicken soup, packed with dumplings and noodles. Tibetan Green Fried Chicken with hot garlic sauce, the starter, was so scrumptious that I almost gobbled down the entire plate faster than the time it took me to spell out the dish’s name! The garlic sauce was truly finger-licking good. Actually, all the appetisers were spicy, almost as if they were intended to enliven my taste buds for the main course, which was to follow.
For the main course, I went with Thai – Lajnia Fried Rice and Noodles with seafood. It had sea food and meat sandwiched between creamy ground noodles and flavoured rice. Even though the first taste of creamy noodles might seem a bit bland, when combined with the rich sea food and flavoured rice, it created a subtle symphony in the mouth. Talk about the whole being greater than the sum of its parts.
In-house juice and dessert expert, Ribu George, spoke enthusiastically about his experiments with new flavours and asked whether I would be willing to try out his new ‘invention’ – ice cream in coffee. The man seemed to know what he was talking about and I gamely volunteered to have a go at it. The mix of hot coffee and cold ice cream was good, but not as good as the main course and starters. True to their tagline ‘Play the moment, pause the memories, stop the pain and rewind the happiness’, dining out at Hangout is an experience to cherish.
Hangout at Kedaram complex at Kesavadasapuram is open from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. A dinner, with starters and main course for two people, would cost approximately Rs. 400. Contact 9895222574
