Different people…

I heard that some different people would be taking over the biryani rice place here and had brought in four chefs from India to cook at the café…

…so of course, I couldn’t wait to go and give it…

…a try.

There were a few very friendly girls waiting at the tables, a very happy lot but I wish they had been more efficient. My bottle of water came without the glass of ice that I asked for – in fact, they just gave me the bottle, no glass. Our two orders of the biryani rice came and we were not given individual plates for us to use – I specifically asked  for that as we would be sharing the rice and as if that wasn’t bad enough, we were given one set of fork and spoon and when I asked for two more, they brought three so in the end, we had four sets between the three of us.

The mutton biryani (RM17.90)…

…was served first and then another plate came – we thought that was the chicken but no, it was mutton too so it was taken away. I was already fuming but my girl never liked me making a scene in public so I just kept quiet. Then, the chicken biryani (RM15.90)…

…came.

Just then, an Indian guy arrived and he greeted me and came over to talk – it turned out to be the boss, some guy from Penang, Malaysian, and he went over to the nasi campur cabinet and brought us these gravies…

…to go with our rice which was a good thing as there would be nothing else other than whatever sauce they had in a little bowl by the side and a rather diluted raita in another.

According to one of the girls, you can pick your choices from the cabinet (which was not closed the whole time we were there)…

…if you want to start eating right away but if you choose to go à la carte, then you will just have to wait.

I suggested to the boss that he could have banana leaf, maybe as their Saturday or Sunday lunch special – I kept telling the boss at this other place that but it had fallen on deaf ears – but the guy misunderstood me and from his reply, he thought that I was asking him to line the plates with the leaf like what they do here.

Back to the rice, they were pretty good, bursting with flavours and tasted different – the mutton had a hint of mint while the chicken daun ketumbar (coriander leaves). The very nicely done and very tender meat was buried in the rice…

…like what I had once in Penang but thinking that there wasn’t any meat, I asked for the curry, silly ol’ me but it was good in a way as I would want the gravy to go with the rice.

Having said that, generally, I am of the opinion that the prices were a bit steep – just a few ringgit cheaper than that place that we frequent a lot but that one is a nice, classy cafe, not some food court/coffee shop kind of place (and I thought it looked nicer when the previous guy was running the place) plus we actually felt that the biryani selections there were nicer than the ones here…but the ones here had an edge over the rest in town – those were very much cheaper though, I think.

I did not want to order the tandoori chicken but I asked for the chicken tikka (RM9.00)…

I assumed that they would taste more or less the same, anyway and yes, we quite liked it – went well with that what-I-guessed-was-mint-sauce with a peculiar shade of green except that it was all breast meat.

Our garlic naan never came – the chef in the kitchen forgot all about it –  and we had ordered this paneer lababdar (RM13.80)…

…that we thought we could use as a dip when eating the naan. Now, this was really very nice and all of us loved it except that initially, this goondu thought that was tofu in it when actually, it was goat’s cheese. We just had  a bit of it and asked for the rest to be packed for us to take home.

All in all, I would say it was a nice enough lunch and we sure would want to go back again some day to try the rotis and whatever else they have in their menu that we haven’t tried yet.

TANDOORI CAFE (2.289696, 111.828366) is located at the back section of the Sibu Heritage Centre, ground floor, along Central Road – its back/side entrance is beside the entrance into Daesim Mart in that back lane to the right of the centre and is not visible if you are going along or coming from Jalan Wong Nai Siong.