Palms Kitchen brings authentic Delhi food to Kolkata's gourmands

Whenever someone visits Delhi, we inquire about what he shopped for and what he ate. Delhi food just hits all the right notes, always. The new kid in the block, Palms Kitchen, at Jessore Road opposite Dumdum airport had one agenda in mind…to bring the erstwhile taste of Delhi and Punjab to the gourmands of Kolkata.

The owners Sanjay Chadha, Ravitej Nath and Neha Chadha say that the vibrant and boisterous history of Delhi is the prime inspiration that helped them envision the brand and set it up. “Kolkata is the foodie capital of India. The people love their food, so we thought of giving the foodies a taste of proper Delhi cuisine,” says Sanjay Chadha.

The culinary director of the restaurant Chef Ravitej with Chef Joydeep Sinha's assistance has curated the restaurant's menu, boasting a huge array of items to choose from. Since the restaurant is located in Kolkata, the menu also shows a tribute to Kolkata, and quite interestingly starts with the dessert choices, since Kolkata loves their desserts. Another interesting part of the dessert menu is that every sweet dish comes with a shot of green tea that will act as the palate cleanser. An innovative thought indeed.

We started our food tasting with a Virgin Chennai Express, that had our heart, has a base of pineapple, and orange juice with strong flavours of tamarind paste, curry leaves and lemongrass, topped with cola. Next, we tried out their kebab platter Lodhi which had scrumptious pieces of white butter chicken tikka, silbatte ki mutton Shammi and tandoori fish tikka. For the main course, we tried Do Phool Ek Maali, which tasted as dramatic as it sounds. It was a cauliflower, broccoli musallam that had chunky pieces of both these veggies baked in a gravy of almonds, brown onion, and tomatoes and finished with saffron and cardamom. We also tried their Nalli Nihari which had two mutton shanks cooked to perfection in true royal style with whole spices. A great nalli nihari should have the most satisfying fall-of-the-bone texture, and we give the chef full marks for this. We enjoyed these with Khameeri Kulcha. 

For the desserts, we had the most interesting Afeem ka payesh which basically is a posto and gur payesh, served with a dollop of daab malai ice cream and that shot of green tea.

Meal for 2: Rs 1200+ 

Pictures by Pritam Sarkar