Saturday, July 25, 2009

Bang bang, you're fed

A plug for gunpowder...the restaurant, that is. It’s been a while since I’ve come across an eating joint that’s as aptly named as this delightful little place in Hauz Khas Village: the food explodes in your mouth, and I mean that in the best possible way (mirchi-intolerants, desist).

Gunpowder: The Peninsular Kitchen is fast developing an intense following among south Delhi’s cultural set – artists, publishers, authors. I heard about it from four different people in the space of two days (hat tips to Mary Therese Kurkalang of the German Book Office and Chiki Sarkar of Random House India) and one danger is that it may soon have more customers than it can handle (even though it isn't easy to find and you have to walk up three flights of stairs). Much like the Goan eatery Bernardo’s, which sadly moved from C R Park to Gurgaon a couple of years ago, Gunpowder is a small place, run by two people with a little help from friends and volunteers; already the owner Satish Warrier is requesting people to call up and make reservations before dropping in for dinner.

We’ve only been once so far (technically, twice: the first time we didn’t have cash, they didn’t have a card machine and there wasn’t an ATM close enough) but plan to go again very soon. We had pork in Coorg spices (a generous quantity - enough for two people with moderate appetites), the fluffiest Malabar parottas I’ve ever laid teeth on, and Andhra “meen” fish curry with steamed rice. It was all spectacularly hot and spectacularly good. The pepper chicken and beerkai mutton are next on my list, and their daal sounds promising too. The menu is small – and handwritten, in a register – but that isn’t a problem; we aren’t going to tire of this food anytime soon.

Check the Facebook page for details and updates (and dire warnings about lack of kitchen help).

9 comments:

  1. So will Jabberwock be writing food reviews now onwards? :)

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  2. Nope. Have done a bit of that in the past and haven't enjoyed it one bit. Bad enough that reading books and watching movies has become a chore - if that were to happen to my food-love, I'd have to kill myself.

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  3. umm...Andhra 'meen' curry? never met a self-respecting person from Andhra who called fish 'meen'.

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  4. They get full marks for that kolam logo.

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  5. I am not sure if they call fish as meen in AP. They do, in TN and Kerala but maybe this hotel does bcos of the malabar connection! But if you want anything close to hot and spicy food, you just need to go to AP and drop into any of the restaurants in that state! It is actually a test of guts!! ;-)

    Destination Infinity

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  6. Space Bar: I think they treat all of coastal south India as one amorphous space (for culinary purposes only!) - so the menu doesn't make these finer distinctions. Also, I think it was written as "Andhra fish curry (meen)".

    Destination Infinity: yes, have been to a couple of other good Andhra restaurants in Delhi: the best (and most authentic) is probably the Andhra Bhavan.

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  7. Good you mentioned Gunpowder , however the food is just too spicy for someone as intolerant to Mirchi as yours truly. I went there with a friend and one has to admit that the grub is good ,however the tolerance of my constitution towards such high spices is quite low by indian standards.

    I remember my friend's mischiveous grin after the food and his low but boastful exclamation of kyon beta ---- gayi!

    On a serious note write some more food reviews , they have a crinkling dose of good humour with good insights about the food - better than some snobbish and bored reviewer writing about food while clearly wishing to be elsewhere.

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  9. :) you liked it sooo much you reviewed it! hope to bump into you there sometime...

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