Rude Food by Vir Sanghvi: New flavours on Delhi's plate

Hindustan Times

a day ago

It pains me to say this, but when it comes to food, Delhi has lost out. Bengaluru is now the food capital of India. And Mumbai is the only other city where exciting things are happening.
Part of Delhi's problem has been a lack of space. That has eased somewhat with the opening of a new restaurant hub in South Delhi called Eldeco Centre. I haven't been to all of the Eldeco places but I have eaten at four of them.
6 Ballygunge Place is an outpost of the celebrated Kolkata restaurant. It has enthusiastic young chefs, and when I went, soon after it opened (for Sunday lunch) it was packed out with joyful Bongs. Years of living in Kolkata taught me that the standard Bong response to restaurants serving their own cuisine has two steps. The first step is joy, happiness and pride. The second step, after the meal is: 'It is okay. But you know, my mother's food is so much better.'
In this case, I guess we have a variation on step two: 'It is fine but the Kolkata branch is so much better.' Perhaps Kolkata has left a deep impression on me because that was exactly my reaction too! But I don't know if I was motivated by misplaced nostalgia for the original or whether I went too early, before the kitchen had settled down. You should try it anyway. (For the record: I was recognised.)
Kaméi is an oriental restaurant from the Wadhwas, the restaurateurs behind the popular Fio restaurants, who I have known for a long time. They have been asking me to visit ever since Kaméi opened, but I was able to sneak in, unrecognised, one day for lunch.
The food is crowd-pleasing Asian. I tried lots of things: Chicken Kara-age, a lurid rose prawn har gao dumpling, prawn tempura and spicy tuna. All of it was cooked to a certain standard, which is why the restaurant is doing well.
There was a funny postscript. Vineet Wadhwa messaged to point out that I had yet to visit. I responded that I had already been. No, you haven't, he replied.
'Not at Kaméi. I think you visited another restaurant.'
When I persisted, he phoned and explained that it was impossible for me to have come without his team noticing. Finally, I sent him a copy of my bill to prove I had been there. He conceded that they had missed me, but added, 'I truly feel that there's much more to Kaméi that hasn't come across!' So, maybe I will go back.
I know Saket Agarwal less well, but when I went to his Italian restaurant in Kolkata, I was impressed by his passion for food and his willingness to take deep dives into various cuisines. Saket has opened Latoyá at Eldeco, which serves Latin American food, consisting of cuisines I know very little about. I was able to get in unrecognised to have lunch with Gaurav Sekhri, the global gourmet whose many interests include Fratelli wine.
We had a perfectly reasonable meal, were impressed by the quality of the ingredients and by how much research Saket had put in to come up with an original and very different kind of menu. (Service was a bit iffy, though.)
At the end of our meal, Saket walked in, saw me and complained that I had not told him I was coming. I responded that the whole point of sneaking in was for no one to expect me and that, in any case, he should be pleased that we had enjoyed the meal in happy anonymity without anyone giving us any special treatment!
The star of the Eldeco restaurants is, of course, The Arts Room run by Navneet Randhawa and Randeep Bajaj, who are married to each other and between them, have been involved with such successes as Town Hall and Amour. The Bajajs are well-travelled foodies who have been to every international restaurant worth going to. So, they were very clear what they wanted with this place: An elegant relaxed space with high-quality but comforting food.
Though the cuisine can sometimes be a little too chefy, this is the closest anyone in India has come to recreating the vibe of the iconic London places founded by Jeremy King: The Wolseley, Le Caprice, and The Ivy (which Jeremy revived). You can have a wonderful large meal or just a coffee and a cake. They will treat you in exactly the same way and you will get the full Arts Room experience. (I was not anonymous.)
Eldeco Centre is the new restaurant hub, but it is by no means the only place where new things are happening. I was intrigued to read about a restaurant called Via Bianca in the Greater Kailash market. Intrigued, because, unlike 99 per cent of Italian restaurants in India, it seemed to be doing something different: The food of Puglia.
I was in Puglia for nearly two weeks last month and enjoyed the food. So, I looked up Via Bianca on the net. I found the address, but no way to book a table. I tried Instagram. It listed a number for the restaurant. I called to book a table for lunch at 1.30. The phone was switched off. The Instagram page said I could message for a booking. So I did. There was no reply.
Then finally, after 12, the phone came on. I called and booked.
When my wife and I got there, we found two young waitresses who handed us menus. The list of dishes looked good but nobody made any attempt to explain the unfamiliar food, and frankly, I got the distinct impression that they would not have been able to handle questions anyway.
We ordered, based on our memories of Puglia, and were not disappointed. The panzerotti, a kind of Puglian calzone, were good. The pizza was sort of Roman style and was fine. The lasagne was acceptable, but could have improved with more ragu and less besciamella.
But let's not nit-pick. I was particularly impressed with the restaurant's courage in putting spaghetti all'assassina on the menu. This is one of the few Italian pasta dishes in which the uncooked spaghetti goes directly into the pan.
As we were enjoying our food, I finally got a response on the restaurant's Instagram page confirming our booking. I replied that this was a bit late. Then, Kamalika Anand, the young chef who has opened the restaurant, messaged me to apologise.
At this stage, the service changed. A manager suddenly materialised out of nowhere, bowed and scraped and then spent the rest of lunch standing a few feet from our table and staring unnervingly at us. Then, just before Kamalika arrived, a full complement of waiters suddenly appeared and pretended that they had been there all along.
I liked Kamalika and I liked the food. But we were the only people in the empty restaurant, which is crazy for food of this quality in this area. But it was not hard to see why. It was difficult to book a table and the front of the house was appallingly run.
People tell you that if you have good food and a great location your restaurant will do well. They are wrong. The service team is often the difference between success and failure.
I hope Via Bianca fixes its service issues because it really deserves to do well.
From HT Brunch, June 14, 2025
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