New Year Trip : Pune

To start off - a very happy new year to all of you! May the year be full of good times with food, fun, friends and family! :)

So this New Year's eve a bunch of friends and moi drove down to Pune after work. We reached the city limits at around 10:00 PM, and it being the Eve, obviously no halfway decent restaurant could accomodate a gang of last-minute guests. (We tried calling, we did!) So it was 'rush into the first restaurant with table space and fuel the body's dying metabolic fire' (especially as one of us was getting cranky due to hunger pangs)

We stopped at one of the ubiquitous 'garden restaurants'(garden - aka a few trees with more twinkling lights than leaves, plastic 'patio' furniture, scrubby grass - you get it) scattered around the outskirts of Pune.

Called 'Saundarya', it was prettier than most I have seen, though and it was located en route to the Hinjewadi Infotech Park. I didnt have too many expectations from such a place though the prices were pretty steep - I thought it was a simple case of high demand, low supply which dictated the prices.

Luckily for me, Saundarya came through with some amazing grub. We sipped on Manchow soup (steaming hot, spicy hot and with a touch of tongue-tingling sour), feasted on a chicken banjara kebab that was lusciously soft and yummily spiced, fought over the zingy Paneer Chilly and Veg Crispy (Indian-Chinese aka Sino-Ludhianwi starters) - though the Veg Crispy was accurately described as 'Schezwan Kanda Bhaji' by one of my friends.('Schezwan' being the Sino-Ludhianwi bastardisation of Sichuan)

The main course - Paneer Butter Masala and Murg Mussalam (more like Chicken Tikka Masala with leftover Tandoori Chicken rather than leftover Chicken Tikka)and hot crispy rotis and soft naans was equally tasty. When the same old oft-ordered dishes manage to awaken your tastebuds and give a prod to your palate, you know you have hit upon a culinary winner.

The next 18 hours or so passed by in a wirlwind of long, long drives through the moonlit countryside,
a mesmerising firweorks display atop one of the hills around Pune, singalongs to the tunes strummed on a guitar in the wee hours of the night, a watful of comforting Maggi at 6:00 AM in the morning, a tummy-soothing South Indian breakfast, a delicious home-cooked lunch at a friend's - all culminating in one of Pune's culinary achievements- the chocolate thickshake at Cadby's.

Cadby's is a drink, a dish, a place, a concept. Rich chocolatey milkshake (I doubt there's ANY milk in there, it is more like chocolate icecream churned with even more chocolate) with surprise nuggets of milk chocolate buried deep within and topped with a half-an-inch thick layer of chocolate rubble.

You cant sip this heavenly concoction with a straw - it needs to be 'eaten' with a spoon. As you wade through the chocolate carapace on top and start dredging through the intensely chocolatey milkshake underneath, you are bombarded with half-molten chunks of real chocolate. Every gulp is a revelation of rich chocolatey goodness, unlike any ever tasted before. Even a die-hard chocaholic like me can manage to reach the bottom of a half-glass but the truly intrepid (one of my friends is one!) can take on the full glass and emerge victorious in a haze of suagr-and-chocolate-and-cream. :)

Mid way there - whew!
So, the next time you're in Pune, dont miss on this treat to the tastebuds - available at Kothrud and Deccan Gymkhana.