A humble visit to "Bharatiya Vijay Hindu Hotel"

As I stepped out of the hustle and bustle of goregaon station. Something growled, I looked around for some sort of mangy mutt troubling some old gujju lady and then I realised it was infact my stomach that was carrying out vociferous protests. In a stereotypical scenario I would have gone to the regular hunting grounds, "Sai Veg World" or had assorted bhajiyas Rs10/- and satisfied my hunger only to rush and catch a bus. But today, when I came to think of the fact that I have lived in Goregaon for nearly 4-5 years and hadn't explored the so-called unconventional/ unhygienic/ small eateries. I decided to look around for an eatery that I hadn't visited before. This wasn't very difficult as when I came to actually searching for a place to eat I crossed atleast 3-4 hotels but Id decide that I didn't want to splurge on something I had not savoured before and hence that sort of aided me in my decision.

The one thing that immediately struck me was the fact that they were so specific in mentioning what they sold,
Fafda, Jillebi, Chai, Coffee!
To be frank, I was never convinced by the idea of either of the three components fitting into my idea of a wholesome meal with a high satiety value. With fafda you can't really go wrong, then again may be you can. As a kid I was allergic to jillebis, even the sight of one of those gawdy orange concentric rings would give me an asthma attack. Over the years human nature has taken over me and well I have become immune, but in any case I have absolutely no idea as to what to expect from the perfect jillebi.

On entering the "hotel", on my right I saw, 2 x 7 covers with a couple of people already seated, a well dressed gentleman who I presumed was the cashier and owner? of the place. I propped myself on one of the seats to the right. A few curious eyes swept the room. A little out of place, who cared? A guy who I presumed to be the waiter approached me with two glasses of water and slid both onto the table with utmost finesse. I glanced at the board and a little hesitantly asked him to get a plate of Fafda, to which he promptly asked, "Jillebi nahi lenge?" I glanced across at the nicely arranged tray of jillebis under the Sun lamp, They looked wonderfully juicy, succulent and shimmering almost lustful to look at like the legs of a stunning woman with wonderful glowing skin.

Okay, maybe we should stop at that.
In short I couldn't resist it especially since another guy across my table was eating just that.
Almost instantaneously I was served a plate of probably 8-10 pieces of Fafda and 3 jilebis also some sort of Slaw at the side. I also ordered a cutting chai. I dug into the fafda because it looked like the safest thing to start off with. It was not as crisp as I thought it would be but at the same time it wasn't as though it had gone damp because of keeping it outside. After a couple of bites I started enjoying the rich taste of dalda (okay maybe not as rich as butter), i took a bite of the jillebi and it confounded my senses it was crispier than the fafda although it didn't look as crispy. At this point of confusion I decided to go for the mystery slaw. On further enquiry I found out that the slaw was prepared with raw papaya that had been i presume grated/to make sure that some sort of juice does come out of it on keeping it outside and the flavour of the green chilly really give it some depth (+turmeric+greenchillies). There didn't seemed to be any sort of salt in the slaw that confounded me further but on further analysis I figured that there was sufficient amount of salt in the fafda to compensate. The container with the slaw was kept outside near the sun lamp of the fafda which again seemed a little odd since at the end of the day there was no sort of preservative and the heat from the sun lamp could possibly lead to the spoilage of that raw unprocessed slaw, the papaya seemed to have given off some water, i can only imagine how amazing that water might have tasted if added in the form of a dressing or as a part of a marinade. When I had the slaw, the dish was truly complete. And I thought to myself, this has really, got depth. At some point several decades ago some smart&/hungry&/jobless gujju has had all of these together and has manged to wonderfully fuse these 3 components into one dish and make it a real seller. The cutting chai was the added bonus. It was good enough for me to order a repeat and really savour the food that I had just eaten.

Going a little deeper: It occured to me.

1. After a couple of bites the fat in the fafda tends to coat the palate, hence the numerous glasses of water, slaw to cleanse the palate.
2. The taste of fafda can really get monotonous due to again the high faat content and the placid nature of besan(gram flour). The Ajwain added a minor dimension but didn't have a notable presence.
3. What better than to contrast saltiness with sweetness of the jillebies.
4. The texture of the fafda and the jilebi was very different although both are fried articles and that kept the interest going in the dish.
5. The sugar content in the jilebi was just right for me, since it didn't aggressively over power the sweetness in the chai.

On the menu, I interestingly saw a beverage on the menu called:

1. Tum Tum Chai - Rs.10/-

By the time I had spotted it, i'd already paid and decided I leave it for another day.
My bill came to a paltry Rs.24/- but the experience I had was worth a lot more.

What I learnt today?

Epicurean experiences are very similar to trying to remember the dream you had last night. You know the outline but the details seem to fade away very soon. So I decided to pen my thoughts PIPING HOT!