Foodie Jaunts

Managing two blogs is quite a tall order; at least it is for me, therefore when my brother Aroop Bose took pity on me and suggested he would do a restaurant review, I jumped at his offer. This is, however, a restaurant review with a difference — the restaurant is Spice Tree but he isn’t reviewing the food available there but – on second thoughts it would be better if I hand you over to my brother, so read on…

Kong Poush Kashmiri Food Festival at Spice Tree – Taste of Kashmir
 by Aroop Bose

Goshtaba and Nadir Palak

It was about three years ago we tasted food from Kong Poush the first time; it used to be a restaurant located in suburban Mumbai. We had brought home a parcel of Goshtaba and Nadir Palak. The dishes were delightful, Goshtaba is a mutton dish, the mutton is in the form of soft balls like a kofta but not exactly the same, the mutton is actually pounded into a pulp like state before the balls are formed, the gravy is yoghurt/dahi based. Nadir Palak is a dish prepared using lotus stem and spinach as the main ingredients. Sometime later Kong Poush shifted to Goa which was a bit disappointing for us because we loved the dishes we tried. Early last month I was pleasantly surprised to receive a text message from Sunil Mattoo, the proprietor, saying that
Kong Poush was holding a Festival of Kashmiri Food at a restaurant called Spice Tree which is located at Bandra West in suburban Bombay. Since it was a very convenient location we immediately decided to try out the food there.

Instead of eating at the restaurant we preferred to bring home

Maaz Yahin

parcels of Maaz Yakhin (Rs. 399.00) and Dum Oluv (Rs. 289.00) and try these in the comfort of our home. Maaz Yakhin is a mutton dish with yoghurt/dahi based gravy and Dum Oluv is a potato dish, ‘oluv’ is potato in Kashmiri, it is what is generally referred to as Kashmiri Dum Aloo. Dum Oluv also has yoghurt/dahi based gravy; it is reddish in colour because of the use of Kashmiri chilli powder. Kashmiri chilli powder lends a rich red colour and flavour to the dish without making it hot or ‘theekha’ as we say in Hindi. Maaz Yakhin was delicately spiced just the way we like it and was a

Dum Oluv

delight. I have tasted this dish and goshtaba in Srinagar (Kashmir) and I loved it there, the Kong Poush version is equally tasty. Dum Oluv tasted beautiful, while eating the oluv or potato I initially felt that there was some kind of stuffing inside which tasted good, but I was mistaken because it is not meant to be a stuffed potato dish. The gravy had actually seeped inside the potatoes giving me an illusion of presence of some kind of stuffing, which is how a good Kashmiri Dum Aloo should be.

To make the best out of the Kashmiri Food Festival we decided to

Kong Poush Batta - Saffron Rice

visit Spice Tree Restaurant again. This time we ordered parcels of Kong Poush Batta or saffron rice (Rs. 189.00), Rista (Rs. 399.00, Goshtaba also costs the same) – this dish had mutton balls similar to Goshtaba, but with a reddish gravy, and Tamatar Chamman (Rs. 329.00) – paneer or cottage cheese pieces in red colour tomato based spicy gravy. This time we happened to meet Sunil Mattoo at the restaurant. Since we were planning to take the dishes home and eating them later, Mattoo told us that the mutton balls in Rista would harden and to bring back the

Rista

softness he advised us to boil the mutton balls for about ten minutes before eating. We took his advice and wow! The dish tasted great and the balls had become really soft; Tamatar Chamman was also very tasty. Kong Poush Batta or saffron rice was pleasantly unusual, the flavour was subtle and delicate and went very well with the two dishes, incidentally Kong Poush literally means saffron flower in Kashmiri. While we waited for the food to be prepared Mattoo treated us to a cup of Kahwa, a kind of tea Kashmiris drink. I am

Tamatar Chamman

not sure exactly as to how this tea is prepared, it seemed to be lightly spiced and had pieces of almond in it which lent the lovely flavour.

In all we tasted seven items from Kong Poush and are very satisfied, we now look forward to the next Kashmiri Food Festival by Kong Poush since there are many more dishes to be tried. Those who wish to know when and where Kong Poush is planning to hold its next festival can visit the Kong Poush Facebook page. I hope Sunil Mattoo is soon able to start his restaurant. 

Note: Prices mentioned above do not include service charge and taxes.