LUCKY RESTAURANT

"Some say the standards have slipped, but I'm still in love"

My last triumphant Biryani in India was at the aptly named "B IS FOR BIRYANI" in a tiny lunchroom in Kochi. My mind still reels at the memory of tender, fluffy rice, succulent meats and the overall hum of a restaurant full of content diners. Covid then came and threw an arsehole of a spanner in the mix, and I was resigned to dream about such decadences from a freezing cold cabin in Norway.

​Fast Forward to present day and India was arrived in and mouths re-awakened in loving stuffings. 

Again, I did my research and with the help of many Indian friends who worried for my sanity if I did not eat at their long list of restaurants, Lucky Biryani crept up time and time again. I showered off the film of international flight and caught a non-ac cab through the spewing tarmac and pollution of a city I love.

Shown a table with tactical assuredness, Biryani ordered, coke sipped upon, fan noticed, cars creeping by outside at snails pace beeping at the lights to turn green. Biryani arrived, decadent crown of saffron-ic occult layers, deep divine flesh of earthly birds, full spices from gardens of Ganesha. 

I sat and wept inwardly at the passage of time and the theft of the last two years. The grains of rice comforted me and once again stirred the will to live in a frail, battered soul, kept apart from his adopted homeland by way of a global pandemic.

Lucky, no matter what they say about times past being greater, you are still great to me! 

These recommendations are just personal opinions based on my palate, things change, chefs get fired or replaced, places open-close, relocate, so take it all with a pinch of MSG  and discover your own gems too. But please do try a few of these, they have been researched exhaustively.