India Day Four: A South Indian Feast!

Hello! I'm sorry for not posting more recently but I got sick (again) and then we flew back to the US. Even though I didn't feel well for part of the trip, I have no regrets and I had an amazing adventure with my Mom. I have skipped day three because that was an office day followed by a plane trip from Delhi to Bangalore. Nothing really exciting happened that day!

On day four, however, we were treated to an amazing dinner at Dakshin at the ITC Windsor. The hotel itself is gorgeous with British charm and it is one of the oldest hotels in Bangalore. 

We walked towards the restaurant, excited to try some South Indian cuisine. Since going to India, I noticed that most Indian restaurants in the states have North Indian style food with curries, Tikka Masala and Naan. We were promised that South Indian cuisine would be very different. As one example, we would eat on a banana leaf with no silverware!

Once seated Mom and I were given jasmine either to wear as a bracelet or to put in our hair. I chose to put the flowers in my hair, which is the traditional way. This was perfect, as I would get an amazing whiff of the flowers throughout the meal.

Our table ordered the set menu, which had four courses. Mom and I chose the non-veg option, while my Mom's co-workers chose the vegetarian menu. The first course was a choice of four chutneys to be eaten with breads or the other courses. 

Papadum

From the top: tomato, coriander, peanut and coconut

My Mom really liked the freshness of the coriander chutney, while I loved the coconut one (even though I don't normally like coconut). My least favorite was the peanut chutney just because I don't like the taste of peanuts. 

Next were two pancakes (dosas). One was sweet banana and the other was savory with tomatos and scallions. 

The darker one is the banana dosa

Next is where we got into the meats. First we got fried chicken in a red sauce that was really flavorful and quite spicy. We also were served a chicken curry that was good and close to what I would get in an Indian restaurant back home. My mom's co-workers then insisted that we had to try the lentil patty from the vegetarian menu. I had never tried anything with lentils in it and I was surprised to find that I really liked it. 

Lentil patty and chicken

Chicken curry

That was all part of the appetizer course of the meal if you can believe it!! We had a few more courses to go through!

For the main course four small bowls were placed around the edge of the banana leaf. Two of them were non-vegetarian and the other two were vegetarian. We were also given a Parotta to dip in the different sauces. The Parotta it is cooked on a pan and not in an oven like Naan bread (which can be found at most Indian restaurants in the States).

Left to right: veggies in a coconut soup, spring onions in a tomato sauce, a chicken curry and a lamb curry

My favorite (and Mom's) was the lamb because it was spicy and the lamb was perfectly cooked. I even used the Parotta to get all the sauce!

Then an Appam was placed on top of everything. An Appam is an Indian breadmade with a fermented rice batter and coconut milk. It was supposed to be dipped in the veggies and coconut soup bowl. It was like a french crêpe that was a little spongy. 

Then we had a curd rice (or yogurt rice), which was served cold. It was supposed to cleanse our palettes before dessert. I had a few tastes before deciding that the curd rice was not for me (or Mom). The texture was pasty and the flavor was somewhat bland.

Here is a photo of my finished plate. It was impossible to finish all of it! 

For dessert we had a sweetened coconut soup (I found a similar recipe HERE). It was cooling and satisfying after a spicy meal.  My favorite Indian dessert, however, is still Gulab Jamun. 

This was one of the most amazing meals that I have ever had. It was very different and it was in such a unique and exotic setting. I don't think anything will match up with this meal for a long time! One of my Mom's co-workers gave us a recommendation for a South Indian restaurant in NYC.  I also want to point out that while I have tried to remember the details of the meal, I've probably messed up on some of them. Sorry! The next post will be about our last day in Bangalore.

See you next time,

Kara

Washington, D.C. Day One | Reunion, Memorials, and A Milkshake

So quick update before the main blog, I think that when I travel, I won’t do daily posts because I want to enjoy the trip without worrying about posting. I am currently in Massachusetts and I will post once a day for what I did in Washington, D.C. The family and I had a great time, and I can’t wait to start college there!

Our first day in D.C. was a good one. Mom and I left Massachusetts at 10:30 and Dad and Emma left Florida at 8:30. We met at our hotel, the Topaz Hotel, hugged, and then walked to brunch. I had read about this bookstore-slash-café in THIS article and I knew that I would love it. Kramerbooks is right off of Dupont Circle and has a great outside patio that we sat on. First, we were served a selection of fruit and breakfast breads. We talked about what we had done over the past three weeks over our delicious meals. Steak and eggs for me, scrambled eggs with bacon for Emma, soft-shell crab and eggs for Mom and a Cubana sandwich for Dad.

Then we decided to walk to the White House for some obligatory photos and then down to the Washington Monument. From there we walked down the National Mall to the World War II memorial. I had never seen that one and it was really beautiful. We were able to dip our feet in the water, which was AMAZING because my feet were getting tired.

Doesn't Emma look adorable? 

After resting, we walked down to the Vietnam memorial, which is just hauntingly beautiful. I was telling Emma why it looks the way it looks and we walked slowly around it. I also took pictures of the women’s memorial.

We headed back to the hotel to rest before meeting Ashley, who we saw a few weeks ago while driving up to Boston. We let her suggest the restaurant and she chose the Hamilton, which she said was one of her go-to restaurants in DC. Let me just say, this place was HUGE! The food was good and we got to talk about life in DC.

I got a delicious chocolate milkshake that I savored throughout dinner and Emma snuck in a few sneaky sips while I wasn’t looking! For an appetizer we got California Rolls, Emma’s favorites, Spicy Crawfish Rolls, and tuna tartare, which I have just started to like.

Look at that! Yum! My tummy is growling now!

As far as dinner goes, I got the grilled pork chop with polenta and rainbow chard. It was yummy and tasted like comfort food. Emma has recently been in a BBQ ribs/pulled pork phase and it started with this pile of pulled pork on top of mac & cheese on top of a piece of bread with onion strings on the very top. I did not think that she would finish it, but she got close!

We didn’t have room for dessert so we took a cab back to the hotel to rest well before our full day of sightseeing the next day.

Thanks for reading!

Food, Biking, and TFIOS

Sorry that I haven’t posted lately . . . I was busy and I wasn’t motivated to blog. I need to find more motivation to do this. But enough with this, on with what I did last week!

On Tuesday I was supposed to go on a photography tour of Beacon Hill, but it was canceled. Instead I stayed at home and watched Game of Thrones, which I am obsessed with now. Mom came home early and we decided to go down to Boston to take a walk and eat dinner. We walked around the Greenway from Faneuil Hall, pass the Aquarium and to the end.

Then we went to the North End for dinner. When Mom and I go to the North End, we always try to go to new restaurants. This time we went to Parla, a new restaurant on Hanover Street. The menu has really interesting choices and I would really recommend it. It was intimate and unique and yummy.

For an appetizer, we had the boar meatballs with tomato sauce.

My entrée was quail egg carbonara and Mom got the striped bass with Israeli couscous.

On Wednesday I did a bike tour with Urban AdvenTours. The tour I did was the City View tour, which was about three hours long and covered ten miles. We went from the North End to Beacon Hill to Fenway Park to the MFA to the Aquarium. It was a lot of fun and a good way to get out of the house. Our guide was really knowledgeable and I want to do other bike tours in other cities.

After that, I met up with Mom at Quincy Market and we went to Wagamama for dinner. I have loved Wagamama since I went their location in Convent Garden in London last year. It’s fast, yummy, healthy Japanese food. We got the steamed dumplings to share, and then I got the miso beef ramen and Mom got the Crunchy Mango Salmon. All of them were great!

Thursday night I went to see The Fault in Our Stars during the special “Night Before Our Stars” event. I got a special poster and bracelet, and after the movie there was a live-streamed Q&A with the writer of the novel (John Green), the stars (Shaliene Woodley, Ansel Elgort, and Nat Wolff), the producer (Wyck Godfrey) and the director (Josh Boone). The movie itself was beautiful, heart breaking and hilarious. The book is amazing and I recommend that you read it before watching the film adaptation. It is about cancer, but it is not a cancer book/film.

Friday was spent recovering from getting home after midnight the night before. I slept in and watched more Game of Thrones and made a quesadilla. When Mom came home from work, we decided to make some homemade lobster rolls using cooked lobster, mayonnaise, celery, green onions, and tarragon. I didn’t take any pictures because I was too hungry that night to take any! It was so good and satisfying!

Thanks for reading! I’ll be back tomorrow with my weekend adventure!