NEW DELHI: This culinary ship docks at the coastal haven of Sanadige, a restaurant in the diplomatic enclave of Chanakyapuri. It’s been standing here silently for over a year, but of late, it has come out of its silent cocoon, to create a buzz about its bonafide coastal cookery talents.
Sanadige in Dravidian language, Tulu, means a brass lamp that’s lit as a commencement to mark the solemnity of important occasions. Appropriately enough, you’ll find a multi-layerd one positioned in the middle of a marigold, rose and rajnigandha rangoli. It’s a warm welcome from the nippiness of the outside.
The restaurant is largely a Mangalorean dining place that also touches upon the coasts of Goa, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Kerala. The chef, Sukesh Kanchan, is Mangalorean, which explains the liberal presence of coconut and curry leaves in the food. “I’ve had food at a couple of coastal restaurants but I was appalled at the way they throw in tomato and onion in everything. That’s not the way coastal preparations are made,” he says.
Case in point is the Chicken Ghee Roast, a Mangalorean recipe with origins in Kundapur near Mangalore. The dish uses a special kind of chilli called Byadgi grown in Karnataka. The preparation takes several hours as the chilli has to be blanched and de seeded before it’s grounded and cooked in ghee for five hours. That’s how you get the dense red colour. But in several city restaurants, a quick substitute is the tomato.
Take some leisurely time out for the Sanadige experience, we’d say. As the food is not one to be chowed down.
The chocolate brown sink-in sofas are extremely comfortable but they’re a tad impractical for an average height person, as the elbows barely make it to the top of the table. The ambience didn’t catch up with its coastal quintessence. A lot more could have been from its reasonably spacisious three-level space.
The food, however, was a different matter. Mutton Sukka came in a brass skillet, laid over the supplest green banana leaf. It’s tenderness was testimony to the proficiency extended into its execution.
Chicken Pepper Fry came with a whiff of earthiness and a delicious sharp aroma. It’s best had with the spiceless neer dosa. Similarly, the Alleppey Meen Curry with raw mango slices is one of the best recipes of the restaurant. Kerala parantha goes well with it but other options such as Muttai Appam with an egg yolk in the centre could be a good bet too. Try the moode, which is a semolina cake steamed in a banana leaf parcel; Pundi, which is a roasted semolina dough that’s steamed; or some of rice preparations. “We get all spices from Mangalore. The fish comes from Sri Lanka,” says Kanchan.
At Sanadige, the real joy is in ditching the usual choice of drinks for regional concoctions. They include Sol Kadi, which is a Konkani beverage made of coconut milk, dried kokum and roasted garlic; Sambharam which is buttermilk; and our favourite, the Elaneeru Shunti Nimbehanu which is tender coconut with pressed ginger and coconut juice. “If you had Sol Kadi everyday, you would never fall sick,” says the chef, who brings a slice of his Mangalorean food culture from the coast to the shore.