A dragon from Kolkata

Sample a home-grown style of cooking, inspired by China and shaped by Indian flavours

There’s Chinese. And then there’s desi Chinese: Spicy curries, deep fried chicken and prawns in a golden batter.

A lot of these dishes originated in Kolkata’s Chinatown, where a community of Chinese traders worked in tanneries, and started a number of restaurants.

Now you can get a taste of their unique food, inspired by China and shaped by Kolkata at WelcomHotel Grandbay’s Hotel Grand Bay’s restaurant — The Residency., attending their Indo- Chinese cuisine promotion. Dive in to taste the India version of Chinese food at the . The chef along with his team have crafted a menu that draws inspiration from Kolkata’s Chinatown.

The month-long promotion is a tribute to the culinary escapades of Kolkata’s Chinatown, famous for Indianised Chinese food.

I begin with dragon chicken, which is possibly created by the Hakka community that first settled in Kolkata, according to legendso. The chicken, which is deep fried, is a perfect blend of tender chicken covered with crispy rice granules.

Rice and noodles dishes on display at the Indo-Chinese food festival at Hotel Grandbay

The amalgamation of Indian and Chinese food can be attributed to the alleys of the Chinatown, where Chinese immigrants settled decades centuries ago. An elaborate menu of soups, starters, rice and noodles, dim sum, and dessert have been curated for this promotion.

“The main ingredients of Indo-Chinese cuisine include ripened chillies, ginger, garlic, fish sauce, lime, sugar and chilli paste A proper Indo-Chinese meal should consist of a soup, a curry with various accompaniments and a meat dish with vegetables,” said executive chef Sridhar Kare.

My journey begins with a spinach egg drop soup. The soup, thick with with finely chopped spinach and egg tastes better than it looks as the subtle flavours of spinach and egg complement each other.

Next on the table are starters, which are dominated by chicken and prawns. The v-shaped chicken wings, named exactly as after the way it is presented, would is fairly bland without the garlic dip that is served along with the starters.

Dishes of soup and starters on display at the Indo-Chinese food festival at hotel Grandbay

While every bite of chicken wings was bathed soaked in dip, I dispensed with it when I started on crispy butter chilli prawns. The prawns are dipped in flour and deep fried, then dusted with chilli flakes and a touch of lemon and butter. Deftly made with well balanced flavours, they stole the show.

Biting into the crisp layer accompanied with springyness of the prawns teamed with a lingering spicy-and-sour flavour was delight.

For the main course, I try triple Schezwan fried rice. which not to my Again, there are no surprises. came in three tiers. It is essentially a a layer of fried rice with schezwan curry on top. This is then topped with fried noodles, resulting in a riot of flavours.

Dishes of soup and snacks on display at the Indo-Chinese food festival at hotel Grandbay

Finally came the awaited part of the meal: dessert. Deep fried vanilla ice cream dusted with coconut powder and served with fruit salsa is a winner: it is a clever combination of tangy salsa juxtaposed with the mild sweetness of deep fried ice cream.