Cilantro’s menu reads like a multi-cuisine ‘Greatest Hits’ selection. The 52-seater restaurant located within Sugar—a brand-new business hotel which opened on Nettoor’s NH Bypass—seemingly accumulated its dishes after scouring through every Indian eatery: crisp-fried honey chilly potato, citrusy Hawaiian salad, and fragrant karimeen pollichathu. The list goes on.
Not that it’s a bad thing though, especially considering how satisfying the garden glove chicken soup is; with its julienned veggies and coriander-infused broth. City folk generally don’t tend to go past the Kundannoor Bridge for gastronomic reasons unless they’re making the long haul to dine at Ramada or to maybe grab some fresh veggies from the Maradu vegetable market.
However, we recommend stopping over at this 46-room property’s casual diner the next time you’re in the general Maradu area, as whatever executive chef Praveen Thambara dishes out seems to taste extremely nice.
Culinary update
The Aryabhangy Group, which owns the establishment, picked chef Praveen to head their kitchens as he has had over 17 years to hone his culinary skills—with stints at Dunes (Dubai), Pearl (Kochi), and more. This is proved after a perfectly-charred plate of cream slathered murghi tikka arrives and vanishes from our table, in minutes. “We’ve just completed our soft launch phase. Hence the commonly seen recipes. These are dishes that do really well with our patrons,” explains the 35-year-old, serving me a platter of wok-tossed mushroom pepper salt topped with burnt garlic and sauteed onions.
“Currently, we’re working on over 10 new dishes and they will eventually be added to the menu,” he adds. The tangy-yet-refreshing take on a coconut water-based ilaneer kozhi curry and the spicy Erode-inspired chicken Pallipalayam are some of the upcoming entrants into their menu. One of our favourites is pairing their neychoru atop a medley of spring veggies and supremely well-marinated cuts of tender beef. Of course, you can’t call yourself the Sugar hotel and not have great dessert options and we thought their payasam varieties were satisfactory.
From 7 am to 10 pm.
anoop.p@newindianexpress.com
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