Last night Goosepig and I needed somewhere to get dinner close to Theatre 3 and Delhi 6 on Childers Street seemed to fit the bill as the tumbleweeds blew through the supposedly revitalised and vibrant precinct.
I’d had a reasonably good lunch there a couple of years ago so why not do the sit down dinner experience.
The place was mostly empty when we got there, maybe a handful of couples in the big space.
We were greeted promptly and lead to seats by the window.
Drinks were ordered and we settled in with the menu.
Not after a big dinner we decided to split the chicken crackles, thinking it sounded like some decadent spiced treatment of chicken skin (more on that later), and get the tandoori sizzler plate.
Our drinks arrived. The waitress had brought out my Kingfisher with the lid on and didn’t have a waiters’ friend. Eventually my beer came back.
After a lengthy wait in which the (suspiciously like those from a supermarket packet) pappadums were devoured, more ordered, devoured, and the small talk was beginning to verge on painful, the chicken crackles arrived.
One supposes that if one was Indian, nd all food was doused in vast arrays of weird spices something bland might be quite novel. This might explain something less interesting than a Maccas Chicken Nugget appearing before us.
Our fault for misreading the menu we suppose.
Around this point we had come to notice things were going seriously awry with the wait staff.
One dude just walked around the floor doing laps with a bottle of water. But never filling anyone’s glass and avoiding all eye contact.
For a long time the waiters were all huddled behind the bar in a grouping sure to get the back up any halfway competent floor manager.
And then there were the Chinese waitresses, in an Indian restaurant, with English so bad they couldn’t take a very simple drinks order (one Sav Blanc, one kingfisher).
Watching the failings of the numerous waiters at least kept us amused as we waited for the food.
Finally our sizzle plate arrived!
It was theatrical! It was well executed in that all the meats were cooked and yet still tender and juicy.
And yet, at some point, one has to wonder if India, with its teeming multitudes of peoples, creeds and cultures, can really only produce the one marinade in which to coat the meat before sticking it in the tandoor. There are counties in the US with greater culinary diversity.
On asking for the bill, slowly and carefully complete with the universally known scribbly hand gesture that has seen me right from St Petersburg to Singapore, I was asked what kind of bill I wanted.
It came to $84. Which for a light dinner for two with just two drinks each is getting on the steep side.
The food is not bad. The service is diabolical to the point of comic relief, but the prices for mine are too high considering what that kind of money can get you elsewhere.
We did, however, get out well in time for our show.
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