Hyderabad House tonight [Edit: Past Event]

Hi,
JimtheBeerGuy & I (and kids) will be at the Hyderabad House tonight around 7:15 to check it out. JBG & I went to India House last week, and we thought we'd died and gone to heaven. It was exceptionally good Indian food. We've been jonesing for Indian food again ever since, and we were looking for a hole-in-the-wall comparison, and found the Hyderabad thread. So join us tonight if you're in the mood for good food!

Ah, I've been meaning to visit Hyderabad House for the past week or so. (Just let me tell ya: trying to get lunch from HH during fasting week's probably not the brightest idea -- they opened at 3 or 4 in the afternoon. Should be fine now, right?) I'll check my schedule and see if I can go, too.

Any idea what dishes you want to order? I remember reading the long HH thread and culling their lamb biryani and lagan chicken (or was it chicken 65?) for possible consumption -- with presumably better dabal ka meetha (Indian bread pudding) for dessert at Daata Durbar three doors down south. (Thanks for the rec, c8w.)

http://lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=1911

Indian/Pakistani sodas are another matter altogether.

--Dan

HI,

If I wasn't program chair at a meeting this evening, I would be there.

Regards,

Okay, I'll be there, wearing my typical Cubs floppy hat to boot.

See you soon,
Dan

fastfoodsnob wrote: (Just let me tell ya: trying to get lunch from HH during fasting week's probably not the brightest idea

hehe!!!!

Any idea what dishes you want to order?

--Dan

y'know, it never occurred to me to figure out what I wanted to order before I got there..... I really have no idea. I feel certain JimtheBeerGuy will want to order something with lamb in it.

Well it was a busy weekend with Saint Pizza's parents in town and then the Bears game last night which almost had me burning my treasured Bears jersey, so we haven't had a chance to post an update until now. Sorry if my memories are a bit vague as a result.

Saint Pizza, our two sons D & M, and fastfoodsnob met up at Hyderabad House last Thursday evening for some good food and good times. We weren't as good about taking pics of everything before we ate it as we should have been. Our only excuse is that we were pretty hungry.

Our 6yo M doesn't like spicy food, so the guy behind the counter said he'd make him a non-spicy gyro. It turned out to be kind of huge. I wouldn't necessarily think to order a gyro from an Indian restaurant. I also wouldn't necessarily think to put carrots on a gyro. But it wasn't bad.


Here I am presenting a dessert. JimTheBeerGuy's first law of being photographed--the photographer always waits until you have the goofiest possible expression on your face to snap the pic.


We had I think 4 or 5 entrees in all, including mutton masala, a ground beef dish I don't recall the name of but that was very tasty and reminded me of the filling of jamaican meat patties, the chicken biryani, the chicken tamata, and M's gyro (which was way too big for him to finish by himself). Also several of the flatbreads and a few sauces.

I don't know what this sauce was, it had a pepper submerged in it and tasted like cumin to me. In the foreground, the remnants of the chicken tamata we ordered.


A blurry close-up of the aforementioned sauce.


A devastating storm of some kind seems to have struck our table! Actually, it's been half-bussed already. As you can see, this restaurant carried some pop in glass bottles and we tried all three varieties. The cola was interesting but I didn't think it was that special. The fanta was really good, and the lime-flavored one, don't remember the name, was my favorite. Unusual and refreshing.


Here's a group picture. I have no idea why M is making that face.


The guy on the left here showed up as we were finishing up our food. He was really friendly and encouraged us to try desserts and indian tea. Also some sort of leaf-wrapped sweet which was a sort of after-dinner mint. (Google and vague memories tell me this might be called paan?) Anyway, when we first showed up, we were welcomed and the guy who helped us was quite nice. This guy I think made us feel even more welcomed though.


So that was our night at Hyderabad. It was great meeting fastfoodsnob and trying a new place to eat. I think Saint Pizza and I both agree that we'd like to go back sometime. In the meantime, there are a lot more restaurants for us to try.

Hey Jim, nice report, but none of the images are showing up. www.allthingsuseless.com doesn't exist.

Ooh, nice write-up, Jim. And I'm glad you all could make it to Honey 1 the following night as well! The lime-flavored pop was the (in)famous Limca, frequently referenced in the main thread concerning Hyderabad House. Here's the first post with a reference to it there (nicely fitting pictures, too, though let's just say I'm a fan of more American sodas):

http://lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?p=19612#19612

As I mentioned to Cathy2 the following evening, the lagaan chicken/chicken 65 wasn't available on the menu that night, but I suppose it could make a surprise appearance at HH again in the future (on a different day of the week). The paan palate cleanser was a strong herbal experience which I probably won't repeat again -- heck, the tabacco chewers proly get a lot more out of it than we did -- but felt it was something worthwhile simply to try. Offering the kids more "traditional" candy afterwards was a nice gesture, though. The tea they asked us to try was kinda weak, though, both in potency and flavor. Maybe that's what it's supposed to be like? Checking out the dabal ka meetha (a house specialty, according to our later host) was nice, as I had never had it before in any restaurant or form. Very tasty, and a great overall dinner to share with my generous tablemates (who even shared their sodas!).

Thanks for family night,
Dan

gleam wrote:Hey Jim, nice report, but none of the images are showing up. www.allthingsuseless.com doesn't exist.

True, none of the linked images are loading. At least the smaller(?) versions up in this thread are here for all to see. Edit: ...Er, not anymore? The pictures were loading just fine for me here until a minute or two ago. Anything change over there, Jim? Hmm... midnight on the East Coast... just over ten minutes ago! D'oh?

--Dan

They're working for me. However, it does appear that today is the day I'm supposed to renew this domain.

JimTheBeerGuy wrote:They're working for me. However, it does appear that today is the day I'm supposed to renew this domain.

That would do it They're working now.

JimTheBeerGuy wrote:I wouldn't necessarily think to order a gyro from an Indian restaurant. I also wouldn't necessarily think to put carrots on a gyro. But it wasn't bad.

I wouldn't think to call what's in front of M a gyro either. Looks like cubes, not slices, and looks like paratha, not pita. But that's just quibbling.

Ghareeb Nawaz has "gyros paratha" on the signage outside; I've never ordered it so I don't know if the meat is more like what you were served or if it's sliced from a Kronos cone.

I think I recently saw it (gyros) on another lunchy/fast foody indian menu somewhere, but I can't think of where that might have been.

JimTheBeerGuy wrote:I don't know what this sauce was, it had a pepper submerged in it and tasted like cumin to me. In the foreground, the remnants of the chicken tamata we ordered.

Was this a "sauce" or was it an entree that you ordered ? I'm wondering if it could possibly be mirch ki salan, which is a curry (for lack of a better word) containing banana peppers (or sometimes other peppers). It's a Hyderabadi specialty, and is quite different than typical salans as I learned from my recent tutorials in the kitchen with my mother. For example, I had never seen the addition of dessicated coconut or ground peanuts in a salan before, but it, along with the other spices, yields quite a nice (complex) overall flavor. I believe Sazerac may have a report on making this (I hope!).

On the other hand, that "sauce" could've simply been some sort of achar/condiment.

tatterdemalion wrote:Was this a "sauce" or was it an entree that you ordered ?

The bowl in the top part of the picture was a sauce (it came with the bread, I think), and the bowl in the bottom part was tamata, with all of the chicken picked out and eaten.

The sauce tasted a lot like sesame paste.