My restaurant
experience began with a rather awkward phone call to make a reservation. “Table
for two at 7.45pm please and the name is Rajan” said I. “What is your name again
sir?” asked the lady on the other side. “Rajan” said I slightly louder,
presuming it was a bad connection” “Can you say your name again sir please?”
said she, sounding like she had heard that name for the first time. “It is Rajan, let me spell it out” said I but
before I could muster to spell, the hostess had an epiphany. “Oh it’s Aarrrjan”
said she sounding rather triumphant. This funny confusion succeeded in transforming
my irritation into amusement as never before was such a leap ever made, I had
heard, “Ranjan” “Ragin” and how can I forget the host at my college canteen confirm
with extreme caution “Is this Ravan?” and then look at me as if to search for the
remaining nine monuments of cranial architectures. My parents who always prided
themselves in choosing a simple and easily pronounceable name were finally proved
emphatically wrong. Despite all this, the hurdle of complicated name and the
reservation was crossed and we had a confirmed table for two.
The restaurant is
the recently launched Mexican Grill place appropriately named The Asados,
located in Bandra. Upon entering the premise we were confronted with the toughest
challenge one usually faces at a relatively vacant restaurant- the choice of
seating, it has to be nowhere within range of sigh of the washroom, not too
near the kitchen, not too near the entry and not too near anywhere that allowed
innocent but ravenous onlookers to take a peek at your food and salivate.
The interiors were
rather pleasant, the combination of the wall paintings of an idyllic Mexican town and the soft lighting gave it the ambiance of a nice the old-fashioned grill
eatery. Just before I could
begin to enjoy myself the rude interjection of the rather unremarkable Spanish
rendition of the rather unremarkable Michael Jackson track, “I Just can’t stop
loving you”. The waiters were looked like they were back from a sale of the
costume designer of the Steve Martin flick ‘The Three Amigos’, and had managed
to get everything but the sombreros of course.
We began by ordering
the imaginatively named Mexican Seafood soup, we asked him to describe the
soup. “It is soup with crab meat and squid and Mexican spices, it is very good
sir” This sounded like a splendid idea. “Well make that one by two please” said
I. There was an awkward pause followed by a smile and mumble “We don’t spilt
soup sir.” Rather surprised at the almost inflexible attitude of our host when
it came to redistribution of soup I firmly but politely inquired about the
reason, but again treated to a mumble of a defense. Conflict can never be a
solution to deal with intolerance, if we were to install democracy we had to
begin with diplomacy. Hence we entered a dialog on the challenges of soup
redistribution. After much discussion we
instill tolerance into our host and he agreed to get an extra bowl were the
soup could be re-distributed. Since little was to be gained by inquiring about
why the location of the table was preferred for soup redistribution instead of
the kitchen, I chose to nod with approval without any utterance and allow the
life to take its course when the soups arrived.
Then came the
breads, with an interesting accompaniment of garlic yogurt, a paste of green
tomato like chutney and a mustard like looking but sweet tasting paste. The
kind waitress patiently explained to me their names and ingredients, despite her
effort and my attempts, my brain took over and successfully wiped out any
traces of memory of those wonderful sounding names the moment the kind waitress
left our table. As we kept ourselves occupied with bread the soup arrived. To
our great disappointment it was more a broth with pieces of crabs with the
bones, shell fish with shells and rings of squid. The waiter awkwardly
conducted the redistribution of soup by trying to evenly split the number of
crab pieces and sea shells. I wondered why they had chosen to call it a soup
and why we weren't properly explained the nature of this broth masquerading as
a soup when we asked our host. We sipped our soup but it wasn't satisfying. We
now grasped why our waiter was unwilling to split the soup. He was no dictator
of the land of Asado, there was clearly a reason behind his intolerance to
redistribution. Even Karl Marx would have agreed that re-distribution in this
case was not so great an idea.
As we finished our soups our starters arrived. We had ordered a prawn preparation. It had an interesting look to it, the prawns were fried and wrapped in a crispy fried vermicelli. The three pieces were places on an oval shaped plate as we sipped our soup. This was clearly a winner. This was the tastiest among the dishes served that evening, despite not being unique in any way. The prawns were tender and the crispiness of the vermicelli added to the experience. The accompanying gravy was sweet tasting rather like a fruit preparation, it was skipped with extreme prejudice.
Then came the time
for the main course, my little experience with Mexican food meant that I needed
some able assistance from the waiter. I skimmed through the menu and stopped
where it said wrap and then it fajita or and then for enchilada, the answer was
almost the same each time “It has a bread sir, and the bread has the meat sir
and some Mexican spices sir” I ordered a Chicken enchilada assuming that their
version would really be bread based item, but instead I got a surprisingly more
gravy that I could have handled. It had cabbage, beans, potatoes and chicken
all immersed in a thick gravy with copious amounts of cheese. All baked. I
thought I sensed oregano that gave it a distinctly Italian feel. I inspected
the contents with great suspicion and had my first spoon. This was a
rather indifferently prepared dish that went was looking for Mexico but probably
ended up Sicily. The lady with me ordered a fried prawn preparation, again the
taste was rather generic, it was like any other fried prawn preparation with a
smattering of spice and herbs.
We were almost done
with our meal when a waiter passing by stopped and quizzed us “No Desserts?” he
inquired. We both said we were full up. And gestured to that almost universal
sign for the bill. Within minutes we had a gun in a holster placed at our
table. I knew our experience at Asados had hardly been sterling but I preferred
a lesser violent way of expressing my dissatisfaction. Seeing our hesitation, the
waiter and opened the holster, pulled out the gun that luckily for us was not a
disgruntled server exacting revenge on a pair of difficult customers it was in
fact a toy gun beneath which was the bill. I did my customary 007 pose of which
a picture was clicked. Luckily for you the picture will never be seen by eyes
other than me and the photographer.
So how was the
overall experience? Much like the Spanish Rendition of the Michael Jackson pop
song, the restaurant seems to be confused about what it want to do. It is rather difficult for a restaurant to serve cuisines that is completely faithful to its origins and still pleases its customer that may have a different food habits. Most restaurants resort to the best of both
world i.e. a little bit of the local taste combined with the taste of the
original. The will explain the bland Indian food served at restaurants in the UK. Asado played too safe and ended up being ordinary.
Why would I go to a Mexican restaurant when the I get similar tasting
food elsewhere?
I often ponder over
the question about what constitutes to make a fine restaurant experience. The obvious answer may be the food. But is it
just the food? Can well prepared dish that is exquisitely presented be enough
to make the experience? Is it the service as well? A pleasant well trained
staff can often soften the blow if the food is mediocre. If the restaurant
serves food unfamiliar to ones palette it does demand a staff that can guide
you through the myriad of choices and who can help decide your choice of dish
based on your tastes. But is that
enough to make a fine experience? What
about the ambiance? If the interiors, the lighting, the seating arrangement,
the design of tables and chairs, the choice of cutlery and the design of the
plates are unusual and intriguing, it can work like magic. And where does the
music stand in all this? The right sort of music playing gently over the
background can add to the experience
For the Asados my
experience was rather mixed, I haven’t had many Mexican meals so I will not be
able to rate this based on the authenticity of the taste food.
- The food gets a 6/10, nothing bad but nothing striking or memorable either.
- The service gets a 4/10, the staff from the phone receptionist to the waiters need to be trained. The waiters need to consume enough Mexican Food to be able to describe it in detail to their patrons.
- The ambiance gets a 6/10, pleasant but nothing outstanding
- The music gets a 5/10, they can do a lot better than playing Spanish renditions of mediocre pop songs from the 80s
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