Indian
May 7, 2009 | 
Author Desi Dragon
Cuisine: Indian Chinese
1/60 MacGregor Terrace
Bardon, Brisbane
Ph: 3369 9558
I enjoy trying new things when it comes to food and I have never had Indian influenced Chinese food before. I took a look at the menu in advance and was intrigued by the notion of Szechuan potato fries and salt and pepper paneer. I had been working up quite an appetite before dinner and the first entree was the Szechuan potato fries ($7). I don’t know why I’ve never heard of potato fries with a szechuan sauce before but they were very tasty. Not very spicy at all though. I wondered if I was enjoying them so much because I was really hungry but everyone else confirmed that they were indeed good for eating.
Next up was the Chicken Saiwoo ($10), buffalo wings tossed in a sweet chilli and shallot sauce. The sauce was sweet but again not spicy. Regardless I was a little disappointed that I had to share the four pieces of chicken.
Our dinner guests had ordered the Happy Dragon Platter for 2 ($19), an entree platter with two buffalo wings, a bowl of Szechuan fries and also paneer and pea wontons and lamboo tikki (some lamb and bamboo rissoles, get it?).
The salt and pepper paneer ($9) was really strange as it was neither salty nor peppery. I was expecting something similar to a nice piece of deep fried camembert but the paneer did not have much flavour and the batter did not add anything to the dish.
When we ordered our mains we asked for them to be served with medium hotness but I’m not sure if the waiter misheard us or underestimated our ability to consume chilli. If only he knew that I have always suspected that one of us sleeps with a bottle of mega death chilli under his pillow (ahemyangcough). The only dish that was a bit spicy was the Chicken Manchurian ($25), chicken dumplings tossed in a soya garlic shallot sauce.
The goat shank Szechuan style ($28) was my favourite dish. The meat was so tender and went beautifully with the herb sauce.
The chilli chicken ($25) was good, though again not spicy. There were dried whole chillies in the dish but I avoided biting into those. I also realised after a few bites that there were whole peanuts in the dish and somehow I survived without my allergies affecting me.
For a fourth main we had a designer main, where you match a meat (or paneer, tofu or vegetables) with one of their sauces. There is a choice of six sauces, Szechuan, chilli garlic, hunan black bean sauce, satay sauce, sweet and sour or ginger and lemongrass. Hubby likes to bring balance to the world by eating the foods I can’t, so he ordered chicken with the satay sauce ($21). He finished most of it off so it appears to have met his love of all peanut foods.
To accompany our mains we had some plain egg fried rice with chicken ($14). I really liked their fried rice, it wasn’t too greasy. One bowl was just right for the four of us after entrees and four mains.
We were much too full to try any dessert but I was very curious about the crisp honey sesame noodles with ice-cream ($7). Our dinner was finished off with the presentation of a small wooden chest which contained a bounty of fortune cookies and of course our bill.
It was a little pricey and I’m not used to paying a lot for Chinese food having been brought up in a family where no one likes to spend a lot of money on food mum and dad tell you they can make at home. But I don’t think mum has ever told me she can make Szechuan style goat shank and it was an adventure trying something new. An exciting night out for a foodie.
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Curry Vault
18-20 Bank Place, Melbourne
03 9600 0144
Organising a team dinner is always difficult, especially when it’s a team with different personality and different tastes. Pannacotta has the pleasure of organising our team dinner the other day and was stressing about where we should go. We finally decided Indian and Pannacotta chose the curry vault.
Potato cakes and onion cakes
Our entree includes aloo tikki (potato cake) $7.8 and onion bhaji $7.8. Deep fried stuff is always irresistible, and this entree is not an exception. The potato cake is lightly spiced but lacks texture. Onion Bhaji is very nice with the chickpea batter. Both dish seemed slightly burnt though.
Our mains came. The first two dishes are lamb Korma $19.90 and baingan masala (eggplant) $14.90. The lamb curry was mild, some of the meat are tough but some are nicely cooked and gelatinous. The eggplant is cooked in capsicum, it was tasty but slightly oily.
I love butter chicken $20.50- it’s soooo bad for you but it’s so good. I was so tempted to follow DB’s lead to scoop the last of the gravey onto my dish and eat the last of the rice with it. Palak paneer $15.90 is cheese cubes with a spinach sauce- yes so it looks like duck poo and some of us are too scared to eat it, but it’s actually very creamy and flavoursome.
Chilli Chicken $20.50 is not chilli at all, although my work friends liked it. When I ordered I asked for extra chilli, but I was warned against it by the waitress, tell me it’s chilli enough. Great intentions, but she really didn’t know how hot I can take it! Fish tikka $14.90 is baked in the tandoor, the fish was cooked to perfection, however the fish is not fresh enough. Although I must say, I’ve tried a few fishes in Indian places, and this is one of the freshest I had.
Glab jamun $6.80 is dumplings w/honey and rosewater syrup. I don’t really know why it’s brownish/ purple-I didn’t actually eat any dessert (*gasp*). Apparently it’s really yummie, I am not a sweet sweet fan so I am not very convinced. Mango kulfi $6.80 is Mango indian icecream. According to DB it tastes like those Weis bar. Yummmm
Overall it was a good meal, more so because of the company than the food. Somehow, an Indian place without Indians eating didn’t really sit well for me. The good thing is that the dishes are not as oily and is more flavoursome than many other second-rated Indian restaurant, but it needs more spiciness and kick to its food. 5.5/10
Curryville
Cuisine: Indian
629 Wynnum Road, Morningside
(07) 3902 0169?
Curries: Between $13 and $17
We had 4 curries, 1 starter and 1 naan between 4 people and were absolutely stuffed and even had leftovers to take home!
Isabel came to visit so we decided to try out a little (very little) Indian restaurant/take away near my house. But good things come in small packages, and Curryville did not disappoint. Its a tiny shop, tucked next to the Foodworks on Wynnum Road. It probably seats less than 20 people but a large portion of their business would be from takeaway orders.
First up we ordered an entree of onions and potato deep fried in a chick pea batter. We had all thought that this meant it was mashed or pieces of potato mixed with onion then battered. However there were clusters of onion, and seperate slices of potato. I have to say the onion was delicious, but the potato did not excite us as much.
Isabel had a mango lassi (a yoghurt drink) to go with her meal while the rest of us shared a bottle of Brown Brothers Moscato. Something sweet all around to go with our curries!
We went with mild curries, but I would have liked to have something medium to shake things up a bit, maybe next time. Our curries came out in cute little pots on wooden pot holders. The pots were not hot, so the pot holders were entirely decorative. It would have been great if the curries were actually cooked in these mini-pots, but I guess they are being efficient.
These were the curries we selected:
Butter Chicken: This one was okay, but not the best Butter Chicken I’ve had before. I wouldn’t say the chicken was dry, but it probably could have used a few little bits of fat (like with chicken thigh pieces) to be nice and tender. Less healthy I know, but so, so delicious (Chicken wings and thighs over breast pieces any day!).
Beef N Potato: I can’t remember much about this one. It wasn’t bad, but not the best of our fare.
Lamb Sagwala: Creamed spinach & garlic with lamb – SO YUMMY!!!!!!!! This was unanimously in the top two of our selection that evening… must… eat… more…
Mushroom Curry: I can’t remember what it was called or what else was in it, but it was sooooooooooooooooooooo yummy. This was equal first with the Lamb Sagwala. I don’t think I’ve ever had a mushroom curry before but this had nice big bits of mushroom. So tasty for a vego curry! 
And of course we had a Cheese N Garlic Naan to go with our meal. All curries came with some colourful rice! Watch out for the cardamon pods though, they add lots of fragrance and flavour to the rice but not so nice if you bite into one.
I will definately have to go back and try some of the other curries and revisit my favourites. Hope to see you there!
