Welcome to the crowded madness of Hotel Vaishali “(Pure Veg)”.
“In all probability, you’re going to have to wait for a table to clear up. Then a waiter will hurriedly clean it up for you. You better rush to the table otherwise there is bound to be another group that’ll grab it before you. Just go sit there, ok? And wait for us.”
Madhura had left a very strict instruction. Madhura (cousin) and the whole lot of my cousins who’re based in Pune had invited me to join them. We were gong to a movie after that (review coming up shortly).
AT 4 PM, on a Sunday, was astonishing. Every table inside the main hall was occupied. The attendant asked me to wait in the porch just outside the main hall. Feeling bewildered in the overwhelming crowd, I went and stood in the porch. And I was taken aback again. Numerous tables were cluttered in the backyard- and each one was full. I was beginning to feel dazed. The whole restaurant was one huge holy noise of jabbering people.
“Side please, side please.”
I was shaken.
A waiter, carrying a tray stacked with five dosas and a plate of idli was asking me to make way for him to go ahead. I looked after him, dazed.
“Can I go in?”
I turned back. Oh my god, I shouldn’t have. She was fair, long hair, doe like eyes, wearing a white plain V-neck T-shirt and jeans, wearing a necklace that hung just a little above the V. Gosh those necklaces look sexy. Like an idiot, I moved and didn’t say anything. She disappeared in the crowd. A moment of stupid ogling is all I got… damn my luck…
“Side please.”
A very gruff South-Indian voice shook my trance. Waiter again, this time with a double order of Sambar Wada and some strange looking pizza; he was bustling into the open-air part of the restaurant.
People were coming in but not going out. Suddenly I remembered that though that girl in the white V-neck was so sexy, she was still in need of a table and if there indeed was one available, how did I not get it before her? But, like an utter idiot, I reckoned I would have let her sit anyway, so it didn’t matter. Damn my luck…
Finally, I was told to occupy a table. A family with a baby had been eating there. The three/four year old had water-skied in her sambar, making the table an interesting mixture of mica-cream and sambar-orange. I chose to ignore it. The waiter came up and cleaned it up pronto, so I had no problem. It was four fifteen so not really four by Indian standard time. The cousin gang hadn’t shown up yet. Just then I got an SMS.
“We’re waiting for you, dodo, who’re you waiting for? Come to the table right across the hall.”
Damn my luck…
The menu card was agonizingly long. I normally have ‘the usual’ order at a restaurant which comprises of things like an idli and a dosa if it’s South Indian. Now, if it’s idli, it’s idli, right? And a dosa is just saada or masala… But you know what dosas we had on the menu here?
Mysore Special Dosa.
Mysore Special Masala Dosa
Mysore Saada Dosa
Mysore Masala Dosa
Mysore Special Cheese Saada Dosa
Mysore Special Cheese Masala Dosa.
You want to listen to more?
Mysore Cheese Dosa
Mysore Cheese Masala Dosa…
Lord, there was every permutation of the words Mysore, Cheese, Dosa, Saada, Masala and Special in the list. Then there were non-Mysore dosas as well… I’ll spare you from the list… But that was not it. There was Sabudana Wada, Sambar Wada, Idli Wada (what the…?), Dahi Wada, Puri Wada, Amol Wada, and Kick Me Wada… puh-lease!
It turned out that 4 PM was chosen specially because Bhel is also available after that…
OH LORD, I was saying… TOO MANY ALTERNATIVES… SYSTEM BUSY!!
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~~ A Review for The Puritans ~~
I think I’ve just about described the restaurant properly. It’s crowded. It’s got tonnes of varieties to choose from. Its speciality is South Indian food. I got all three points across. But there are puritans who shut their head off, close their eyes, cover their ears, slice their tongues and sit down for a review-dialogue. The remainder of the review is for them.
~~ Ambience ~~
You can spell “Hotel Vaishali’s Ambience” in a very simple way—“PEOPLE”. Oh Lord, there is no time of the day when there are no people in the place. It’s always buzzing with a crowd. The crowd is of all sorts. Mornings you have hostelites coming over for a breakfast, joggers for a cup of coffee (so much for the burnt calories…), old men and women relaxing in shorts and T-shirts over a cup of tea and freshly brushed dentures and businessmen loading their (usually large) bellies up before starting their day. Afternoons, you have all those people in different clothes (and for old men, smelling dentures), having lunch. Evening, they come for their snack. Night, of course, they come to figure out if they can improve the railways’ security… Lord, you need me to tell you they come for dinner at night?
Hats off to your covered ears! Give me your earplugs when I go to meet my principal for disciplinary hearings…
Because of the crowd, little scope remains for any decoration. Whatever little decoration there is, the million humans wipe it out.
~~ Food ~~
Vaishali is best for South Indian food. I’ll recommend the Mysore range of dosas. They come with a very interesting “chutney” in them. I’ll see if I can get that recipe from the waiter. That might come a million times more useful to you, right? The “bhel” is good too, but there’s nothing like standing on the side of the road by the hawker’s cart and gulping it down… heck, I love the pedestrian ambience! You get what is called “mastani” in Vaishali, which is nothing but milkshake with ice-cream. I will not recommend it there because, one, you get only few choices and, two; there’s a mastani parlour very close to my home. You better come over there so it’s easy for me to meet up! The rest on the menu (Non-South-Indian) isn’t too good. You only get snacks here, of course.
~~ Service ~~
The service is fast, plain and simple. You don’t have showy waiters speaking proudly in wrong English or pretending to be cool dudes in oil-stained uniforms. They’re simple- collect order, deliver order, take cash payment, clear table. I don’t personally like the “hospitable” waiters at all. I like this simple matter-of-fact service. The oily hospitable waiters remind me forcefully of Congress party members. And I feel like Sonia Gandhi (get me?).
~~ Verdict ~~
Yes if you’re a fond of South Indian food… Yes if you like snacks of all kinds… No if crowds peeve you… No if you can’t drone around a table of happy eaters the moment their desserts arrive so they feel obliged to finish up in a hurry… hark, no!
If you're interested, you can leave an M2M in my inbox. I'll pick you up, say, at seven tonight?
