In spite of having taken a brief hiatus from food blogging, I just couldn’t hold back writing about this place. It is probably about close to two months since I wrote a blog, though I have been eating out now and then. This particular dining experience at Crimson Chakra had to be documented, purely for the love of food.
Surprisingly, in all these years, this is my first visit to Crimson Chakra. 🙂 Yeah, I couldn’t believe it myself! Have heard so much about the smoked rice, elaneer souffle, chilli cheese chicken tikka and a few other dishes, umpteen number of times on various food groups. I had already made up my mind on a few ‘must-haves’ during our visit. Had guests at home and I wanted to take them out to a really nice place and not ‘just any restaurant’. Star hotels were not on my mind. That’s when I thought about Azurri Bay and Crimson Chakra. The former has always been in the limelight for its wonderful ambience and romantic candle light setup and so on, while the latter has always been making news for the food they dish out. So decided to go to Crimson Chakra !
Reaching the place wasn’t a problem as I was familiar with Gandhinagar Club and it was just on the adjacent street. I already reserved a table for 6 people at 8PM and probably for once, reached five minutes early. Surprisingly on a Friday evening, Chennai roads were not so packed and driving all the way was such a breeze. As soon as we reached, I was so surprised to see Azzuri Bay just next to it 🙂 I just didn’t expect them on the same building !
It was a nice bungalow renovated into a restaurant and the ambience was pleasing to the eye. We got a table as soon as we entered, just a few tables were occupied at that time. I already saw that they had an elaborate menu. After a quick look, started to order soup and starters. We ordered a Chilly Cheese Chicken Tikka, Andhra Chilli Chicken, Tangy Meen Varuval, Japanese Fried Prawns with a Dipping Sauce for starters and Sweet Corn Chicken Soup, Sweet Corn Vegetable Soup, and Spiced Chicken and Lemongrass Soup, all of them to be served one-by-two between the six of us. I had the Spiced Chicken and Lemongrass Soup and loved it. Familiar flavors of lemongrass and I am a sucker for Thai Red curry and Green Curry and this was on similar notes. Others enjoyed their soup too. Chilli Cheese Chicken Tikka was basically chicken tikka topped with chillies and cheese. Well, this was not a stunner as I expected, but the chicken was soft, succulent and had a nice flavor. I thought the cheese and chilli in it was a slight distraction to the otherwise wonderful taste. I would have preferred it just plain. Andhra Chilli Chicken, true to its geography, was spicy and hot, not semi-gravy/saucy as in most places, but was dry and just right, loved it. Kids loved the Japanese Fried Prawns along with the sweet chilli dip and had to order one more of it. They really liked it. Since I do not eat seafood by choice, had to let it go. 🙂 Tangy Meen Varuval came a bit later than the rest, and unfortunately, unanimously, everyone felt that it was too salty. I told this to the waiter, who apologised and promptly took it back. He acknowledged that it was indeed salty and they served us another freshly made one which was good, still a little salty, but not worth complaining. We also asked for a dry Prawn starter with lot of pepper and got a Chef’s customised version of dry pepper prawns which was good.
Meanwhile while we ordered the Main course – A Smoked Vegetable Rice, Smoked Chicken Rice, a Veg Bread Basket, Paneer Kurchan and Reshmi Butter Chicken. Son wanted a Chicken Lasagna. I should admit we ordered a bit too much for the six of us, so had to pack a few dishes. Smoked Rice was wonderful, a subtle smoky flavor, so briliant amidst the flavorsome rice. Both the chicken and veg smoked rice were awesome! I tasted Pudina Paratha and Aloo Paratha from the bread basket and they were good. Both the gravies were wonderful. I was expecting a typical ‘red-colored’ Butter Chicken as in most places, but Reshmi Butter Chicken was amazing, with minced chicken pieces, loved the flavor. Paneer Kurchan had nice soft paneer and was very tasty too. Chicken Lasagna was good and I barely managed a couple of spoons after kids finished that. After having a little of each, asked to pack the rest because we wanted to badly taste the ‘most-awaited’ dish of the evening – Elaneer Souffle.
We ordered two Elaneeer Souffle as we wanted to just share it between ourselves, as we were terribly full by this time. The first mouth, YUMMILICIOUS !!!! I am falling short of adjectives to describe this one. Brilliant!! Loved every spoon of this dessert. Its no wonder that this dessert is spoken of so highly among all foodies. We ordered one more of it and it was a brilliant end to a wonderful meal !
Finally we were done with a wonderful meal and it set us back by about 5.3K. Now, the place is expensive, but then, for the amazing taste, and the way each dish stands out, I felt it is absolutely worth every penny spent. The service was very pleasant, and still not intrusive. I didn’t catch the name of the person who waited on our table, heard it as Datsun or Jackson, something that sounded like that. I thanked him for a wonderful service which made our dining experience even better. Would have been good if they had the wireless card swiping machine that can be brought to the table, I had to go along to enter the PIN as I don’t prefer giving out my PIN to others. Rest was all fine!
I would certainly visit again and recommend this place for wonderful food and service!
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