If you are too busy to walk down the streets of Chandni Chowk or Jama Masjid for street food, or are feeling nostalgic about the good old days, I have a solution for you. Earlier this week, I was invited and escorted to a restaurant in the Saket Mall area where you get a glimpse and taste of old favourites. But what’s nice is that the dishes come with a modern tweak.
The restaurant is called Desi Roots, and it is in the restaurant block of the malls (behind the Saket City Mall, and near KFC and a Royal Enfield showroom; phone no: 011-33106105). The décor is understated, and reminds you of the seventies. The menu card certainly does, with a black-and-white image of an Ambassador car, a rakish gentleman with drooping moustaches and a woman with a bob cut.
Equally interesting are the items on the menu – a nice mix of the old and the new. For instance, those who know their old Delhi will know about khurchan – a sweet that is prepared with milk layers. The word khurchan means scrapings, and here you have a dish called desi khurchan tacos – with lamb, chicken or pulled kathal. Or take fish tikkas. Desi Roots serves them with the Bengali mustard kasundi with something called Babloo sauce.
I enjoyed most of the dishes – and the names. The deconstructed samosa had the crust in layers, with potatoes in the middle, and aam papad chutney and small golgappas on the side. The lamb galawati was like a pate. It came in a small jar with a knife, along with wedges of varki parantha. You take out a scoop and spread it over the bread and eat it. It was excellent!
The delicious khichri ke chaar yaar (traditionally, ghee, papar, dahi, achar) came as a presentation of four kinds of khichri – prepared with the usual rice and dal, with jowar, bajra and quinoa.
The dum ki boti had small pieces of mutton cooked on steam, and mutton kuttu came with an onion pachari. The kulle chaat – scooped out potatoes and cucumber — however needed some sharper spices.
The Ambala mutton curry was a bit disappointing. Those days when we used to go to Himachal by road, we always stopped at Puran Singh’s dhaba for his famed mutton curry. This dish has been inspired by him, but I think too much of ghee in the dish takes away the kick that you usually get from black pepper. The dessert – Jamaluddin’s kheer – is sourced from Old Delhi. Jamaluddin – or Bade Mian, as I call him – makes the best kheer in town, with milk that simmers over low fire for hours, taking on a light pink hue.
Equally interesting is the way the food is served. Some of the dishes come in small wooden trucks, some in small pressure cookers.
The place is nice and the service is good. The prices range from Rs 215 to Rs 495 (for instance, the mutton kuttu with Malabari parotas and Syrian Christian shrimp chilly fry with rice podha are for Rs 495).
I love the menu – which is an interesting medley of nostalgia and contemporary times. It’s like having your milk cake and eating it, too.
