We landed at Pind Balluchi as we did not have a reservation at Desi Vibes, where there was a long wait expected, and in GIP, the carnivores vetoed Rajdhani. A very courteous wait staff seated us amongst groups of office colleagues celebrating birthdays, and with the groups at either side of our table singing birthday song you could have mistaken it for an extended, possibly out of tune barbershop quartet.
Since it was getting a little late, we skipped the starters/kebabs and ordered the main courses – dal makhani, kumbh (mushroom), paneer karahi, murgh saagwala and keema matar. Our assortment of breads included plain and butter naans, missi rotis, lachchha parathas and a few of the ubiquitous tandoori roti.
I have had saag-gosht many a times but this was my first attempt at saag-murgh. As would be expected with such a dish, you could replace the chicken with paneer without altering the taste, but that has to do with the meat (chicken in this case) rather than the cooking. The balance of spices was impressive and you could actually taste the saag which is so rare in restaurants these days. Our other meat dish, keema-matar was the disappointment of the day. There was no taste of keema in the dish, and was almost like eating peas in a pale reddish sauce – the restaurant would do well to replace the keema with soya granules and save money – mutton dishes don’t lend themselves well to being assembled with a sauce a few minutes before plating, and that may be the problem here. The vegetarian food was very good with a decent dal makahani, a mushroom dish in which the mushroom still retained some texture and really soft paneer in the karahi paneer.
While I am on the subject, can someone define ‘karahi paneer‘ for me? Any paneer dish can be cooked in a karahi, so it can’t be about the cooking utensil. Many people put capsicum/bell peppers in this dish, but this one was with sweetish onion-tomato based sauce with no other veggies.
So, the kitchen got one of the five curries wrong which isn’t bad. To their credit they offered to replace it, but we were already into our meals and did not have much hope considering how much off the mark the keema was in the first instance. Our assortment of breads were just right in my opinion.
I had a kheer for my dessert course, which would get only passing marks (Hauz Qazi Chowk’s Bade Mian’s kheer gets 90/100 on my scale). Those who ordered Ras Malai (Bengali sweet in a Punjabi restaurant – truly east meets west) and shahi tukda did not have much to complain about either. The waiter was honest enough to admit that their kulfi was sourced from outside, and not surprisingly it tasted like so many mass produced matka kulfis do.
And then there was a sweet twist in the tale – along with saunf (aniseed) came gur (jaggery) instead of misri (large sugar crystals). The gur was tastier than any of the desserts and we polished off a plate of the stuff, in spite of being stuffed to the gills.
For a group of eight, the meal came to under Rs. 300 per head which is quite reasonable for a restaurant in the class of Pind Balluchi.
Ed: (a) The picture on the front page isn’t from Pind Balluchi NOIDA. (b) I tried Pind Balluchi NOIDA yesterday for the first time and was quite happy for most part.
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Siddharta good to read your review. You are right, Kemma must not be added to sauce, it must be cooked in it from outset.
I am always wearie of ordering Keema in resturants – Unless I have seen raw keema. This should be lean without fat. Most butchers put all left over bits including fat into the mincer to create it. The price staggered me – In UK, your whole bill would be per person charge. Thanks for sharing.
Karam, I think it is a bigger problem abroad than it is in India. It is the reason mince is cheaper than other cuts in the west most of the times. In India, we would get the butcher to prepare the mince by taking meat from standard cuts and getting lean meat is so essential to some of the kebab prepations (like tha galauti) in my part of the country (Avadh)
.-= Siddhartha´s last blog ..Best Mutton Do-Pyaza in the World =-.
Revisited the place last week, and in spite of having been pilloried on facebook for this somewhat positive review, I would restate that this is the best restaurant for Punjabi food in Noida. While this doesnt say much and food will not it Gault Millau toques, for those not motivated enough to driver across the Yamuna, this is a reasonably safe bet
@Siddhartha: Agree. I’ve been there a few times since. We go there when we feel like predictable, north Indian food and it mostly delivers.