Pretentious! That's the word that pops up when pubs in Chennai are spoken of! Are you wearing a collared shirt? Are you wearing covered shoes? Well, I understand that maintaining law and order in a place where you drink to lose your senses can be tricky, but that doesn't take away the profiling that happens!

Then Radio Room arrives! Walk in with your undies if you must! OK, that is taking it a bit too far, but they allow casual dressing. Shorts? 3/4 trousers? Slippers? All are welcome! OK, I'm sure profiling happens here too, but it appears to be less about 'rules' and more about the actual 'keep things in order.'

The setting is beautiful! Loads of old radios stacked all over the counters and a beautifully relaxed seating. Of course, I was in on a Tuesday, so I don't know it will be on Wednesdays and weekends when most places have shoulder to shoulder standing as a prerequisite to be called a 'happening place.'

Pub Grub is a cuisine by itself, but except maybe Plan B and Sera (Zara's), no other place in Chennai really has good pub grub. Radio room sets itself apart with a small and easily priced menu! Most starters are priced at Rs. 220 and most mains at Rs. 320! Easy when you are drunk! ;-) No fancy plated large dishes, just easy to eat ones.

OK, I am getting to the food! Fantastic. Vegetarian food was equally fantastic! Broccoli kebab which are usually served in most places with store bought cheese slices poorly melted, Radio room serves it with Parmesan and crunchy broccoli. Tastes great! The mushroom steamed buns was the dish of the day! Super soft buns with super tasty mushroom mix! Reminded me of the stuffed buns at GO GO Ramen!

The fish n chips should be called chips n fish! French fries are such a simple dish, but one that is rarely done correctly. Either they are over cooked and crispy or dripping with oil without any flavour of potato left, but here the chips (most of them) were brilliant. Soft without too much of oil taste and the flavour of the potatoes going right through the palette. The fish was nice, but it was the crumb fried fish while I would have liked the tempura fried. This is off the menu but was recommended by the waiter so we went for that! I guess I should stick to the menu!

I wanted to try out the sliders. Yes, even burgers are small plates (three pieces a plate for Rs. 320), but there was no combo. You could choose either fish, chicken lamb or beef, but all three will be the same. Great for sharing though!

Dessert! Nutella with Maltova Crumble. A simple yet beautiful dessert with loads of Maltova crumble. The beauty? Normally the crumble is only on the top layer, but here they give some more on the side so till you finish the dish, you can take some of the crumble! Loved that part!!!

I don't know about the drinks since, duh, I'm a teetotaller, but the wife ordered a Berry Mocktail which had a cocktail of berries with lemonade. Not my kind of drink though!!!

Oh, this is a great place for celeb spotting. We spotted loads of them!

I guess, I've found my pub!!!!

Radio Room is on the ground floor of the Somerset Serviced apartments in MRC Nagar, pretty close to Leela Palace! 

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I wasn't too excited about mBessy. 'What is new about another resto-bar in a small hotel?,' I thought. Its the fashion these days! Tie up with a hotel that has the required 21 rooms and start off a watering hole! Hmm! Friends insisted on going when they launched and me, though dead tired that day, tagged along! The entry was typical. And the familiarity ended there!

This was a real fine dine setting hiding behind that typical-bar-door. We were whisked away to the first floor though and apparently that's where the action is. The setting is beautiful and eclectic. Completely different from the classy looking ground floor, this was a beautiful resto-bar! While I was still recovering from the beautiful setting that I least expected, we were seated in a nice eight seater with a low table. We can go down for the main courses after we are done with drinks and starters, said Mugesh, their manager. I have known him from his days at Casa Picola and he was as surprised to see me there as I was to see him there! 

Starters and drinks were excellent. I can keep going on and on about the starters as they were simply excellent. The crumb fried prawns, a bunch of nice big prawns, dipped in a flavourful crumbs and fried till crisp, was the pick of the lot, though the others were almost as good! Prawns took the cake as they I love them in general and was happy to not have to leave the shell on the tail behind. It was all done and you had to keep eating them! The Broccoli with cheese was quite excellent with the soft broccoli being coated nicely with cheese and the bruschetta that came along with it was fantastic. The other starter, the spicy chicken skewers were quite nice and didn't stand a chance compared to the other two, but that's okay. The mezze platter was pretty nice with fluffy pita bread to go with the dips. The drinks were excellent from a teetotaller's POV. Some had theatrics like smoke coming out to flavour a drink, but the mocktails weren't too bad. My drink had smoked pop corn on top and in general things were great this far!

And then they sort of went downhill. Being a bunch of six of us, we tried quite a few dishes and really none of them stood apart. By this time we moved down to the fine-dine type place with its rich looking decor and cutlery. Sadly, the food did not live up or maybe the starters were so good that the palate didn't like the mains. Whatever the reason, the pizzas were blah. The Australian lamb felt like it was being handled without care and was rather dry and leathery. The risotto was very very blah. Stuffed chicken breast was rather inedible. Dessert was slightly redeeming. While certainly not excellent by any means, it sort of cooled off the rather bad main course. 

 But going by the quality of the starters, I guess, this place since being rather new has a lot of scope to catch up and get on track with the mains. While the choice of menu is good, it needs some work to get it to match the ambiance and the starters! 

I'll be going back in a month or so to see how things have changed. Do the mains get to appetiser quality or vice versa? Only time will tell.

mBessy is in the ground floor of the newly revampING, Estelle hotel in Adyar, near the Aavin, the first building on the Bessy road. 

A stand up comedian, from Bangalore, a year or so back, cracked a "jokes", "You take a guy from Bangalore and put him in one of your five pubs in Chennai....................." He wasn't very funny even otherwise. Chennai has come a long way since then and pubs are mushrooming all over. However only a few of them stand out though. Maybe the comedian was right.

And Plan B will probably be one of them. Sometime back, my friend asked me if I had the steak at Plan B. I was like, what? Where is that? "You're a foodie? Really?" she snorted. And ever since then I've been wanting to try out Plan B, but never got the chance to, until last Friday. The place was packed to the brim so the three of us got seated right at the very end, next to the bar. And the fun began.

It all started off with the two mocktails and a whisky marmalade which my friend was praising all through the week. Apparently it was fantastic. I wouldn't know. My mocktail wasn't great. And then three fantastic starters as we were ravenous. Loaded Potato Skins! Yum, would be an understatement. It had a sort of crispy sogginess and loaded with chicken. They're quite generous with their meat as we found out during the rest of the meal. Beef Chilli Fries. While I would have liked fries loaded with beef chilli, this was the other way around. A handful of fries loaded with beef chilli. Again. Loads of meat and apparently the fries are just meant to keep dipping into the beef chilli.  And another fantastic starter, the Fiery Chicken. While I loved it, our drinker friend was getting happier . Not sure if it was the whisky speaking, but he was like, "man, this is like the perfect side dish," spicy and juicy and yummy he went on, till the main course arrived.

The burger arrived. Called the Jucy Lucy, it was presented extremely well. My whole body started to salivate just looking at the burger. The patty looked nice, the bun had crispy onions on it and the egg was inviting. Slowly, I took the bite. And. Then. It. Came. The disappointment. The burger, though called the juicy lucy was a little too dry for my liking. I should have ordered the one that had beef chilli on top of the patty. The Beef Steak was the exact opposite. Loaded with beef, it hid a beautifully smooth potato mash beneath it, the plating wasn't great, but the beef was just excellent. It was juicy, yummy and the sauce was very complimenting to the beef. Loved it. "What's a sandwich that doesn't have ham and cheese," said our drinker. He enjoyed his ham and cheese on his own as the other two don't eat pork. He was all praise for it!!!!

They have only two desserts, a 6 layer chocolate cheese cake and a chocolate tart cake. I can't believe I forgot the name of the chocolate cheesecake. Its a crime because it was decadent. The chocolate tart cake was fantastic, but the other one was just a tad better. Actually, no. Both were equally good. Actually no, the tart was better. Okay, final verdict. Both were excellent.

The pricing here is brilliant. A superb steak for about Rs. 350 bucks. A meal for two without drinks can be had about 1k or so, which is brilliant, considering the ambience! Rustic, music filled, happening and seems to be some sort of a melange between a loud bar and a quiet pub!!! Nevertheless, a great place for a Friday evening once you navigate the nasty road to get to it!!

Plan B is off Greme's Road, Egmore. Take the road opposite Sea Shells on Egmore and you'll see the sign boards. 

Concepts come and concepts go, but for something as unique as cooking meat on your table over a hot stone, to survive almost 5 years, is no mean feat!!!! My second visit to On The Rocks was just as fabulous as the first one!

Now, don't let the gimmicks fool you. This place has a super cool lounge in the ground floor where people 'chill' before hitting the restaurant on the first floor to cook for themselves. Being a Friday night, the lounge was packed till about 9 pm after which the guests went up!!!! Nice and conceptually it gives you the pub hop feel within the same restaurant.

Now, the tricks. There is a Lava Stone, heated to 400 degrees and placed right in front of you with an equally big caution placard. Place your finger on the rock and it will be cooked to medium in a minute and well done in 3!!!! So beware. For the faint hearted, there is a kitchen which will do the cooking and serve the food to your table, but this experience is worth it.

Since you are doing the cooking, you need a chef hat!!! It will be given, no problem there. Tongs will be given. The set menu comes with a soup and a dessert, so it is a meal. Priced from Rs. 1350 for chicken to almost up to Rs. 4000 for premium cuts of beef and Jumbo prawns, the choice is small, but enough at the same time. Kitchen cooked dishes are priced between 500 and 4000. I don't drink, so I don't know the liquor prices, but we had one mocktail which we loved. It was orange with something and I forgot the name.

We had just one of the meals and one plated dish, which was an awesome awesome mushroom dish. It had different types of mushrooms in it and Chef Vijay David was kind enough to explain all of them and why it makes a great dish. If vegetarian dishes were this good, I'd turn vegetarian today. Today is the 1st of April by the way.

And then the dish I've been waiting for - the Lava Stone. During my first visit, I think we had prawns, so this time, I opted for the beef. On second thoughts, I would have preferred the prawns. The reason being, while I love to cook, I can't cook the beef to medium, so what happened was that a perfect rib eye steak was well done and dry by the time I realised it was cooked. The a rub and the sauce that comes with it were fabulous and quite made up for the dry meat, but who else can I blame but me? So  when I go back there, I'd cook the prawns and leave the premium rib eye to the experts.

Dessert came flaming. A fabulous creme brûlée. Crisp and hard on the outside, while super creamy in the centre. Another fabulous chocolate cake. They send you off as your finish your meal with a chocolate shot! You can take the chef hat with you as a souvenir. For me it was testimony of my lack of beef cooking skills!

 

Hey, nice car.

Thanks. I like it too.

So where is the treat.

Anywhere you want.

Awesome.

10 mins later.

Dude, our friend has got his car. Lets take him for a treat. Both buddies, the one with the new car and one with an old car walked in.

Yup, I've booked a table for three at Flying Elephant.

Wow, you're treating us at Flying Elephant?

What? When did I say I am treating you guys at Flying Elephant.

You didn't. But I've also booked a movie for the three of us at 10 PM. So we should be good to go after dinner.

I didn't say I am treating you there.

Who said you told us you were treating us there?

Then why do you think I am treating you there.

Remember two years back when I bought my car. How you guys wrung a treat out of me?

I don't remember.

Good, two years later, I won't remember today either.

But I am vegetarian today.

Last time I checked, they have veg dishes at Flying Elephant. I love the place. Let's go. 

And that is how we got the treat from the guy. And that is how we tasted an outstanding burger at the Flying Elephant! Enough has been said and written about the ambience at Flying Elephant. There is nothing more that I can add. 5 levels, a private dining space, multiple open kitchens, a large menu, a dance floor that magically transforms into a large Saturday night pub. OK, I know I added a few words, but this restaurant is designed by somebody who thought out of the drawing board. Not sure if there is a similar concept anywhere else or if this is original, but its excellent. 

We started off with a mezze platter as that had a couple of veg dishes for our friend who managed a smile right through. We loved it. The food. Yes, the smile too, but the food more. And then a qewthow (I am not sure I got the spelling right), which was quite nice. And then a pizza that we got half vegetarian and half grilled chicken. Both parts of the pizza were blah. But me writing this post is not about the ambiance or the service or the pizza or anything. Its the burger! Let me try to describe it.

A super soft bun. A patty placed on top. Cheese on top. Yellow sauce on top. Served open top with the top part of the bun placed on the side. None of the veggies are in the burger. They are on the side. Waiting for you to place them on the patty and close it and make it a burger. The size, well, large. Looking juicy. Inviting. Onion rings on the side. I decide to pack the burger. Placed a lettuce, a pickle, a tomato slice, an onion ring and closed the top. Bit into it. I don't know how my face looked, but my friend took away my burger without asking and bit into it. And then I had a fair idea on my face might have looked. Sloppy. I took a bite. He took a bite. The guy giving a treat looked at us, cursing. Three bites and the burger was done. No words were spoken. 

We were late for the movie and so we skipped dessert. Bill was Rs. 2450 for those four dishes. Bill was paid by the treater. As we walked out of the restaurant, we were discussing the burger, much to the irritation of the third friend. Two people discussing the burger and one person cursing the two people discussing the burger. 

I don't know if it was great that particular day, but that was an outstanding burger! 

Flying Elephant is the outstanding multi cuisine restaurant at Park Hyatt, Chennai. 

Rewind 5 years. Frankfurt, Germany.

Me: Dey, take me and introduce me to some nice German cuisine.

My Tamil friend settled in Germany: German cuisine aaa? Vega vacha panni between bun and a glass of beer. That's all. (For the uninitiated, the literal translation would be, 'Steam pig between a bun ......'

A few days later, we were eating some awesome beef with grilled onions and I question his interpretation of German cuisine. 'Oh, you get these during the fairs only. Yeah, its great!'

Another couple of days later, we were having schnitzel in a German pub with apple beer for him and non alcoholic apple beer for me. I questioned him again. 'Oh, this is actually Austrian, not really German,' he dismissed. Slowly, I figured out some very nice stuff you get in Germany. Yeah, its not Italy or France of Mid east, but it certainly has more to it than steamed pig in a bun!!!! But Oktoberfest is mostly that, with German ladies carrying a dozen glasses of beer in traditionally attire and in the more, well, 'authentic' places, waitresses, lets say, reveal much less to the imagination.

Rewind 2 years. Hyatt Regency, Chennai.

Chef Thomas (the then exec chef): Wasim, can make you some pizza?

Me: No thanks, Chef, I am fine.

Thomas: You won't be fine if you keep eating that much bread with the Madras Curry gravy and nothing else.

All this while, my friend who came with me, stuffed his face with all the pork stuff, looking at me once in a while, like I was missing heaven. And he wrote the review on this blog too! And that is why I didn't bother visiting any Oktoberfest after that in India. The true ones had only pork and beer and thats how it is supposed to be.

2014.

This year, when I was invited, I was told that there is a lot more. Two days before I was invited, I was there at another restaurant at Hyatt and I got a glimpse of the fest. It was awesome. German music, fantastic crowd and buzzing! It was a Friday and the crowd was setting in. And so I went. I ensured there was a beer drinking, pork eating bad boy with me, just in case and Sunday we went. Awesome crowd, nice peppy German music and the Oktoberfest spread. Set up in the outdoor smoking area of the 365 AS pub at Hyatt, this was a feast to the eyes, ears and tongue!

Bad boy went gaga over the beer. 'If I drink 4 glasses of the beer, then it is worth every penny of the Rs. 1700 they charge,' he said. He had a nice chilled glass. And ate the pork. And said it was average. Very average. And then he ate a smaller pork sausage. And praised it. And ate it. And praised it. And ate another one. And praised it. And the cycle continued. Waiter came. Waiter poured beer. Bad boy asked details about the beer. Waiter left. Waiter came. Waiter poured a different beer. Bad boy asked name and details. Waiter left. Cycle continued.

Poor me, sat there, watching him. Yes, there were other stuff. Good ones too. A very nice pretzel, a superb beer batter fish, a really nice chicken sausage. A live counter with nice lamb chops. A very different 'German Pasta.' And some average ones too. Like the chicken schnitzel. And sauerkraut. The Madras Curry dip was sorely missed. But this all about the beer and the pork. The rest was there for those accompanying the beer drinker and pork eaters. But there was one more thing that was sooooo awesome. I mean, I didn't think that a simple virgin mojito could be awesome. Common. What can you do to soda, lime and mint leaves? I asked the beer drinking bad boy to taste it. He was a little stunned too. He kept his beer aside and took another sip, so that must mean something. The balance, he said. The balance of the mint and the lime and the sweetness and the soda was perfect. The desserts were killer that day. A nice strudel, that I wish was slightly warmer, a fantastic chocolate mousse and a little profiterole type thing that was nice!

The best part of this Oktoberfest visit? I realised that 365 AS, is a superb watering hole for catching up with bad boys! The setting is classy, the crowd is very nice, the food is very good with Focaccia right next door so you can get stuff from there, an outdoor terrace to step out to and excellent service. The place was packed on Friday and Sunday and a large crowd was inside unwinding, so looks like I am the last to find out about this place!

From the time I have know Rhapsody, it had a identity crisis. Serving some fantastic Italian food, it had always dabbed with event nights, the best being the Jazz nights that they used to host with Alliance Franca-is for which, at that time, I was a regular patron. With an excellent ambiance, I have always felt that Rhapsody is not doing justice to its setting and now, finally, Rhapsody is trying its hand again at partying!

So every Friday, Saturday and even Sunday (I think), they have these pub nights with a live band and karaoke and that Saturday night when I was there, the crowd, though small, was in a total party mood and they lifted the night! Having just started off, the crowds are yet to throng this place and for me that was a good thing! Yes, I made a fool of myself behind the mic, trying to sing a song, but that was the whole idea!!!

The food was good in parts! That night they had a buffet that was quite far away from Italy with Chilly chicken being a part of the starters! It wasn't great! The grilled tenderloin was dry and chewy. Not good. Then the nice n juicy burger that was the first of the starters that was wolfed down by all of us, was followed by a cheese course. You know how much I love cheese, so I had a sample of every thing that was there and loved it with the outstanding choice of bread that you get! My friend who was the only pork eater in the group was raving and raving about the pork belly and the pork sausages! He was glad that he didn't have to share and I only managed the mashed potato that came with it! And it was super smooth and creamy and we fought off our pork eating friend for the mashed potatoes! There was another Indian starter that was excellent and saved the disastrous chilly chicken! The quiche was good enough and then there were salads and rice and a good round of dessert to finish off.

With the hostess offering a free shot for every one who tried their mouth at Karaoke, it was a fun filled night. Though the buffet happens only every two weeks, the Karaoke happens every Friday. The pub night with the buffet was priced at Rs. 1950 plus tax for food and alcohol, while there was a pricier version for unlimited imported spirits of which my pork eating friend had a glass of red wine followed by a glass of white wine. Not exactly a wine connoisseur type thing to do, but I don't think after the first round, he even cared!!!

The karaoke has ONLY English songs, so if you want to sing Lungi Dance, that option is not yet there! 

Started off 10D quite a few years back, then Winchester a few months back and now Moon and Six Pence joins the club of 'English' inspired pubs in Chennai, though this is a little Irish! Not very far away from each other and I haven't been to Ireland, so I wouldn't know. They got the ambiance right, though it is not as luxurious as Winchester, the theme is just about perfect with a bar and a lounge area that sort of bring in the 'English' feeling! I am presuming that Irish is similar. I heard that they even shipped some wood from Ireland, though I am not sure of that and would like to ask the owners sometime if that is true! However, moving away from Chennai tradition and the one thing that makes it 'more English' than the rest is that there aren't any club rules and stags are welcomed with a smile. Don't know how long that will last, but as of writing, it applies.

What was a tea drinker doing at a pub? As part of a big of Chennai Food Guide's team invited to spend the evening at MSP (Can't type the name everytime, sorry), we had an enjoyable night that invariably happens when you have great company of friends meeting after a while. While the 'drinkers' went crazy on Baileys and other 'liver enhancing tonics,' the only drink I had, pineapple with coke was very bitter the first time with an overload of lime, but the bar tender quickly corrected it and gave me a good one the second time.

But of course I was here for the food. Started off with two soups, a prawn bisque and a vegetable broth and both, though not very rich in flavour were just about right for a soup. A very innovative drink was the mushroom cappuccino, a coffee with mushroom which I thought was excellent. A little more flavour of coffee and it would have been outstanding.

The fish part of the Fish n Chips, the hallmark of any 'English' place was off the mark and was woefully low on the batter. The chips part was excellent, not just in this dish, but in every dish that had chips. Triple cooked, I think and hand cut, I loved them. The Lamb Pie was another excellent dish with fantastic flavours and a super smooth mashed potato on top and I wonder why they didn't serve us a Shepherd's pie, but this one made up for it. The lamb stew, served with a little rice and a reduction sauce was another dish that I thought was quite good, though a few other didn't like it.

The evening had its share of not so great dishes besides the fish part of fish n chips. I did not like the salmon, the chicken lollypop type thing that was served with a different flavour, the open ravioli among other things. The mini lamb burgers would have been excellent if the buns were good, but the buns were dry and a little hard, but with excellent patties. We finished off with desserts - a Bailey cheese cake that had no flavour of Baily, but was tasty as a cheese cake and a rather different apple pie which had very little apple flavour, but tasted excellent. Desserts need to be renamed.

With more than a few wonderful dishes and a very good ambiance, this is not a bad place to visit when you're the 'side dish eating shark who doesn't drink,' but I wouldn't mind going here just for the food once in a while. I don't know if the promoters of the place will like that though!! But a little work on the food and this place can give any restaurant a run for its money.

Moon and Six Pence is on the first floor of the new Hablis hotel, Guindy, a little away from ITC Grand Chola.