Looking to experiment with international cuisines at an affordable price? Try an eye-shaped Turkish pizza or the pretty-looking Nasi Goreng Indonesian dish at an international food festival at Cafe Out Of The Box.
Sip on a summer cooler like a chilled virgin mojito while you indulge yourself with the delicious Turkish vegetarian or non-vegetarian pizza, which turned out to be a pleasant surprise for me as it had less of the tomato base, and more of chicken, mint, black olives and cherry tomatoes with traces of the puree. The thin crust was perfect and so was the quantity.
If you love seafood, try the Nasi Goreng, which literally means fried rice in Indonesian, and can refer simply to fried pre-cooked rice. It is a meal including stir fried rice in a small amount of cooking oil or margarine, typically spiced with kecap manis (sweet soy sauce), shallot, garlic, ground shrimp paste, tamarind and chilli and accompanied by other ingredients, particularly egg, chicken and prawns.
The one served here comes with a topping of a perfect sunny side up egg with salad and chicken satay on the sides.
I enjoyed my portion with the kimchi salad as a palette cleanser, as the taste of the rice with a strong taste of shrimps can get a bit overwhelming.
If you like to start your food with a soup, you may not be pleased by the menu as it has only a French onion variety. However, the main menu of the eatery has ample dishes to serve different interests.
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The festival menu is limited.
Udit Bagga, Director at Cafe Out of The Box, told IANS: "The festival menu has limited options as we believe in quality and it takes a lot of time and effort to design and present a food festival menu.
"The food festival is for a limited period of time and of a certain volume as we use seasonal ingredients for the preparation of all our dishes. We provide the best quality dishes made from fresh ingredients; hence the cost goes high."
Returning to what north Indians say in Hindi - "pait pooja (tummy worship)"... If you are a chicken fanatic who can have anything made of chicken at any time of the day, do try the char-grilled chicken with tangy mustard sauce.
Not a fan of sauces, I just had the chicken which was served with baby potatoes, and it was delightful.
For vegetarians, the mushroom touck is a good option, but it may not be as filling as the rest of the dishes like a Spanish paella, a vegetarian fajita or even the Turkish pizza. So, it is best to order the touck like a starter after the goat cheese sherry shallot vinaigrette salad and then a dish from the rest of the main course menu.
What is interesting at this cafe is there are different chefs for different cuisines.
"Every chef goes through intense training to develop their expertise in a particular cuisine. Each chef specialises in a particular cuisine and hence different chefs use their expertise to curate different cuisines. We have a corporate chef, su chef, 5 CDP (Chef de partie) followed by the junior staff. At Cafe OTB, we want to be the master of all trades rather than being the jack of all trades and master of none," Bagga explained.
The festival will end on May 31.
FAQs
Where: Cafe OTB, Shop No-5, 1st floor, Khan Market, New Delhi
Timing: 12 p.m. to 1 a.m.
Price: Rs 1,100 for two
(Kishori Sud visited Cafe Out Of The Box at its invitation. She can be contacted at kishori.s@ians.in)
--IANS
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