Little things make me happy. The little thing that gladdened my heart earlier this week was a tiny eatery in my own neighbourhood. I had spotted it one day, on my way back home. Tiny it may have been, but the name was big, and the message was crystal clear. Here was a place that sold south Indian food.
The name in itself was intriguing. The Madras, it said in bold, and next to it were two intriguing letters: ID. “What’s ID,” I asked the gentleman at the counter. “Idli Dosa,” he replied. This was just my kind of place, I thought, and decided that I had to try it out.
The markets in Mayur Vihar Phase 2 do not have good south Indian eateries. There is one, in the shopping plaza close to my house, but the idlis there are the kind that can only be used if you are in urgent need of a discus. Then, I remember how happy I was when a restaurant called Malabar opened. But the joy was short-lived: It turned out you didn’t get anything from south of South Extension there.
That is why my heart leapt up when I saw The Madras ID. You will spot it the moment you enter Phase 2 from the highway (G6, Ground Floor, Pocket B, Sachdeva Plaza, Plot no, 25, Local Shopping Complex; 9841733280). I will tell you right here and now that this is one of the best things to have happened to my neck of the woods in recent times.
It serves dosas (plain, special with podi, ghee roast, rawa onion, rawa butter and so on) and utthapams (plain, tomato-onion, tomato-onion-paneer and more). It has medu vadas, masala vadas, idlis and coffee. The food is excellent, and the rates are reasonable. It also delivers to areas at a distance of up to 2 km on a minimum order of ₹200.
We asked for plate of medu vada (₹20 for a piece), a masala vada (₹30), ghee idli (₹40), tomato-onion utthapam (₹100) and Mysore masala dosa (₹90). And even though this is all mostly breakfast fare, it served as our dinner. At the end of it, there were three happily sated people.
The vada was incredibly tasty, crispy on the outside, soft within, and flavoured with peppercorn. The ghee idli , stir fried with cumin seeds in a spot of ghee, was simply superb. I tried out a bit of the dosa , which had been smeared with podi, and found it delicious. The masala vada , which is a variation of the North’s dal vada , was crunchy and full of bits of spicy dal . And the utthapam — a large and crisp base topped with soft tomatoes and onions — was out of this world. I got the flavour of the ginger slivers that had been added to it when I tore off a chunk, dipped it in coconut chutney, and popped it into my mouth.
Apart from the coconut chutney, the food came also with a tomato-onion chutney and a coriander-based chutney.
The sambar, filled with juicy bits of onion slices, was neither too runny nor too thick. I had some of the sambar the next day too, with a little bit of rice, and, despite the absence of a papadam, it made for a nice meal.
The Madras ID has my vote. The question ‘ID hai kya’ has taken quite a pleasant turn.
The writer is a seasoned food critic
