Mexican Food Festival @ Aloft - Cessna Business Park

Bangalore has been an epicenter of the South for several global cuisines and tje city's Mexican food could be ranked among the best in the country (or at least in South India). While there are several standalone restaurants that have been doing a great job in bringing these cuisines to our city, the five star hotels have followed a different strategy and have religiously hosted food festivals to offer these global delicacies to us.

I was invited with a few fellow food bloggers for a preview of the Mexican food festival at Aloft - Cessna Business Park. The festival is on till April 22, 2016.

Pricing 
The promotional menu is priced at INR. 1099 and each add on cocktail could be bought at INR.199 (both of these priced are excluding taxes).

Drinks 

They offer five margarita flavours (Cinnamon, Watermelon, Hazelnut, Tamarind, Cucumber and Pineapple) along with the buffet for this food festival. With tequila being the base liquor - these cocktails are perfect summer coolers if you are looking to beat the recent heat wave in the city.

Food
Highlighting the key dishes from the menu:

1. Nachos with dips - While we love our nachos with regular salsa or Guacamole, one gets to try a few more adaptations and variants of these dips with their nachos here. They offer the following five dips for nachos:
- Pica De Gallo
- Guacamole 
- Mango Salsa
- Salsa Roja
- Gemada Salsa

2. Tacos - With fresh and crunchy taco shells, the chicken tacos was filled with tender and succulent chicken chunks, black beans and veggies. They also offer a vegetarian substitute for the non meat eaters

3. Quesadilla -Again chicken and vegetarion options; the chicken quesadilla was outstanding and is probably among the better quesadillas I have had.

4. Ceviche de camaron - I would have refused to eat raw prawns if not for the description given by the chef. In this dish, prawns marinated in lime for over 16 hours is served with corn, sliced tomatoes, olives and jalapenos. This salad styled offering was a perfect melody of flavours and had a great balance to it.

5. Ensalada Espinaca Y Aguacate
A fresh salad with fresh and green spinach, mangoes, avocado, radish and cilantro-olive oil dressing.

6. Chicken Mole - Chicken breast topped with chocolate sauce
It was my second attempt at mole and I found it more compatible to my taste preference this time around. Unless you have already tried mole's before - it is a dish you might struggle to appreciate.

 

Desserts 
They had two mexican desserts:
1.Tres leches - this was decent, but I must concede that I have had better.
2. Flavoured churros with mango and chocolate dips - found this to be a little off; probably the better churro experiences I have had at other places is the reason.

While the promo menu has enough items to meet your hunger needs, you could also try items from the regular buffet spread if you are dining as a part of this offer.

B Cafe - Shangri La, Bangalore (4/5)

Was invited to shangri la try out the 'mighty lunch' and was really looking forward to it considering the hype the hotel's been generating since its launch. 

Ambience (4/5)

Mighty was the chosen prefix and the grandeur of the hotel and the restaurant set just the right theme for the meal. The restaurant has a well laid out buffet setup and a wide seating area. 

The restaurant has a capacity to accommodate a few hundreds - which seems fair considering the hotel's room capacity and B Cafe being the hotel's coffee shop and breakfast destination.

The seating is comfortable and there is nothing one could complain about their ambience. 

Service (4.5/5)

Their fully energised service team does a great job in ensuring top notch hospitality. Encompassing efficiency of table service, timely clearance of cutlery and crockery, explanation and knowledge of dishes and the promptness of dish delivery at live counters - they had it all going for them. 

The power packed flash mob by the staff was the highlight and brought in fresh life to those who had the pleasure of witnessing and being part of it. 

Pricing (3.5/5)

On a standalone note one might feel they are over priced. But having experienced the 'mighty lunch' and its lavishness - I would have to mention that this is the cost one needs to spend for enjoying a lovely meal with a special one. 

Go there early and stay till then end, have a paced-out meal and that would be the best way to enjoy your experience here. 

Food (3.5/5)

With a wide range of cuisines on offer they have a lavish spread. Some of the cuisines I saw/tried were : North Indian, Arabian, Japanese, Parsi, Pan Asian (Including Thai, Malaysian, etc). 

While there were a few dishes that failed to live up, the ones that were good set the benchmark. The cocktails (especially whiskey sour) was quite good and the huge spread of desserts and home made ice creams is not to miss. Their baklava and arabian desserts needs a special mention as it was easily among the best I have had till date. 

On a summary note, reserve this experience for a special occasion and it is unlikely you would get disappointed.

Aloft, Cessna Business Park - Bangalore

Was invited for a pre-valentines day special event hosted by Aloft-Cessna Business Park along with Food Bloggers Association of India and Burrp.This was also a big event for Burrp considering the launch of their new app and overall re-branding. Check out their app for more details on the trendy new look.

Being the late one as I always am starting to be, I walked in 15 minutes into the first session for the evening - a sampling of vodka infusions. The hotel had 18 flavours of vodka's and it would be unfair on my part to not list them all (for the world has to know the hardwork of a good drink man'a creations)

The flavours were as follows:

1. Rosemary

2. Orange & Rose petal

3. Coffee

4. Cinnamon

5. Green Chilli

6. Star Anise

7. Eucalyptus

8. Black Cardamom

9. Vanilla

10. Basil

11. Lemongrass

12. Seventh Heaven Tea

13. Galangal

14. Black Pepper

15. Mint

16. White Raspberry Tea

17. Rose in Bloom

18. Kaffir Lime Leave

I sampled three or four of them and must concede that the flavours blended very well and had a positive influence on the vodka. Lemongrass and coffee vodka are my recommendations from this section. 

Continuing with drinks and moving to the cocktails section, the hotel had four or five house special cocktails - ones I can recollect are tequila sunrise, flaming baileys-vodka and my standard order - whisky sour. The whisky sour was a little off while the flaming cocktail was as good as one can get.

Food: 

As we were sampling the vodka the service team stepped in with their starters, which included a mix of kebabs and dimsums. 

Kebabs:

1. Mutton turkish sheek - nice tender meat and a perfect sheek kebab. 

2. Clove infused chicken galouti kebab - absolutely stunning! For a chicken obsessed person who appreciates lamb best in galouti kebabs, this is definitely pampering of an extreme level. The kebabs literally melts in your mouth and goes perfectly well with semi crisp mini honey paratas they are laid on. 

3. Minted pine nuts saffron paneer tikka -

The paneer was delicates and vegetarians were raving about the dish. Personally, the benchmark set by the non veg kebabs unbreachable and hence this came across a regular fare. 

Dimsums - while I enjoyed the dim-sum spread, the sauces that accompanied was the highlight. I struggled to resist myself from finishing the sauces (read - tea spoon after tea spoon).

Soup 

Asparagus capuccino served with parmesan crisp

Having got onto the carnivore mood, this soup was a good veg pit stop. It was thick soup which and was paired with white wine. Finished it to the last drop. 

Main Course

1. Pan seared chicken served on a bed on sundried pesto risotto 

The chicken was a tad too dry for me and tasted better when had with an extra load of mushroom sauce. The risotto was good and the finely chopped vegetables  made it better. 

2. Grilled prawns - blood orange - mint flavoured corn mash - saffron aioli

Disclaimer - not a fan of large prawns and avoid it due to my inability to appreciate it's flavour. Hence don't consider my judgement for it.

The prawns had a overpowering seafood taste and found it a little chewy. The corn mash was pretty good and was the part of the dish I could relish. 

The main course was paired with red wine and the hotel does a good job in pairing food and wine. 

Desserts

The dessert was a surprise offering from the chef and all of us were awestruck with the presentation. 

Desserts of love as they can be called, was as much a pleasure for the eyes as it was to taste. 

Personally, I found the event as a great experience to interact with the city's leading food and thirst bloggers and was absolutely floored by a the hotel and it's service team's hospitality. 

On The Edge, MG Road (4.5/5)

I have tried thai food at several places recently and except two or three joints, the results of most of these explorations have been quite average. With this background and zero expectations we decided to visit 'On The Edge'. 

Ambience (4.5/5)

This restaurant has a semi open set up and is located on the 13th floor of Barton towers; a building that has the evergreen 13th floor and ebony in the same floor and commercial office space in floors below. 

We were here on Friday evening and with consistent inflow chilly winds, tasty hot food was the best cure for our needs. Also, the restaurant offers shawls for those who can't embrace the chillness, which I would consider as a wonderful gesture (also after a while it would be impossible to sit around without them - which means its a good customer retention/satisfaction measure). 

The seating options include high rise chairs, wall mounted seating (with cushions of course) and regular dining chairs. Personally, I believe that encompasses all options a place like this can hold. 

With dim lighting, candle lights to support - it might also be an interesting place for a date night. 

Pricing (4.5/5)

I would consider their pricing to be very reasonable when compared counterparts selling similar quality of food. 

Service (4/5)

The staff who attended our tables did a great job in helping us choose the dishes. Also, the wait time for food and drinks was not too long.

One incident that impressed me: as I was clicking the pic of one of the dishes I commented to a friend that it looks great; for which a staff nearby responded saying it would also taste great. What I then thought was arrogance, was nothing but confidence in one's own team. Good job sir! 

Food (4/5)

Our orders included the following:

1. Red thai curry (veg)

Had a couple of small helpings of this dish and it was pretty good. 

2. Pad thai (veg)

Probably the only dish I did not enjoy much. But that's also because I am not a fan of pad thai. 

3. Chilly garlic noodles

A decent noodle offering which combined very well with the curry we ordered (staff recommended). 

4. Stir fried chicken - peanut and chilly curry

The winner dish of the day. The curry was mind-blowing and I am definitely going back to try more of this. 

The curry had a good dose of peanuts and was a thick coconut milk induced chicken curry. Loved the traditional flavours and how the curry combined with both noodles and white rice. 

5. Thai green curry (chicken)

A dish that I have best enjoyed at republic of noodles and singkong and no place has come even close to matching their offerings. 

Well, here is a place that I might now add to that list; curry was a little less thicker than singkong, but extremely delectable.

Drinks

They have a common bar with 13th floor and you would find all the drinks from there being served here. 

I was not drinking but my friends had ordered a red wine sangria and bira (a belgian beer that you do not find in too many places). The sangria tasted pretty good and the beer was as good as always. 

Desserts (4/5)

We ordered three desserts: ebony and ivory,  beeramisu and wayanad. Liked them in the same order and all three of them were unique and relishable in their own ways. 

#ebony and ivory - a chiffon pie with white and dark chocolate swirls

#beeramisu - a beer tiramisu

#wayanad- coconut and jaggery crepe rolls - you would enjoy this is you are a mallu

On a summary note, this place is a must try and I am definitely revisiting!