My last dinner with Lesley before my flight home

Bangalore - My flight back to Singapore was tomorrow and had a delicious dinner at the hotel with Lesley.  The weather was chilly and windy. 

Curry

Nann

Mutton Biryani

Tandori chicken

Barbeque Nation in Bangalore

Bangalore - We went to have some good BBQ food.   

main entrance to the BBQ restaurant

No sure what this was

I had one that was enough for me....\

cooked BBQ 

The meat and vegetables are already cooked for us in the kitchen, and just put on the hot coals to warm it up which is a very good ideal of waiting for the food to cook.

Lesley, Vikram, Puneet and myself 

Breakfast @ ITC Gardenia Bangalore

Bangalore - For the past days, I had good delicious Indian breakfast.  Freshly cooked and delicious.  Michelin wrote a beginner's guide to India bread.

Ragi Idli and Vada

I had Idli which is a savoury rice cake, popular breakfast in Southern India. The cakes are made by steaming a batter consisting of fermented black lentils and rice.   Raji Idli is made from finger millet.

Masala Dosa

Poori 

Poori (also Puri) is made out of flour, salt and water.  The small portions of unleavened dough is rolled into small discs and deep fried in hot oil.  A perfectly made Puri puffs as soon as it hits the hot oil.

Uttapam 

Uttapam is a dosa-like pancake from South India. It is made from the same dosa batter of urad dal and rice. Uttapam traditionally contains toppings like tomatoes, capsicum, chilies, onion and cabbage mix among others. It is generally eaten with coconut chutney.

Lunch - in-room dinning at ITC Gardenia

 Bangalore - Just arrived to Bangalore and decided to just order room service.  ITC Gardenia has a touch screen near the bedside has everything at the touch of the button.   I ordered lamb shanks and it was one of the best lamb shanks I have eaten ever, so tender and soft.

Lamb shanks

Garlic nann

and 2 pieces of garlic nann and it was very good lunch.  

Flew on Vistara Airlines

Bangalore - Took an early flight from New Dehli to Bangalore on Vistara. Vistara is a joint venture of Tata Sons Private Limited and Singapore Airlines Limited (SIA), wherein Tata Sons holds 51% stake in partnership and Singapore Airlines owns 49% stake. The company is registered as TATA SIA Airlines Limited.

A full serviced airline with meals on board for a 2 and half hours flight.  Seats are comfortable and the ride to Bangalore was smooth.

Hyatt Bangalore always a pleasant stay

Bangalore - Breakfast was fuss free with a wide spread of India cuisine from Masala Dosa to Idli and the usual western pastries and bread.   The weather was a cool 17 celcius and a lovely morning to start the day.   After a hearty breakfast, we are off to commence our day of seminar.

I went for a run on a treadmill for 30 minutes and the night was falling so I took a nice and cool stroll around the swimming pool.   It was a nice view of the swimming pool all lighted up under the night skies.

Nice glow of the swimming pool

Dinner was a short stroll from the Hyatt hotel down a dusty road crossing a treacherous traffic light onwards to Oberoi Hotel.   The hotel gates were closed so you might have easily miss the entrance.   I just open the gate and was quickly greeted by the security guard at the entrance.

Oberoi had 4 restaurants - western alfresco dinning, Chinese (Szechuan Court), Thai and cafe style buffet.  We chose the buffet after reviewing the menus of the rest.   It was a good choice as this restaurant had a BBQ Tandori cookhouse outside the restaurant and you had a selection of fish, prawns, chicken, and vegetables.   Unfortunately, the prawns and fish was not fresh.     On the whole, the dinner was really good with great hospitality.

Bangalore on arrival - a nightmare

Bangalore - Upon arriving I was expecting a breeze through the immigration as usual but I was disappointed in being the last passenger out of the terminal.   It all began when I decided to go via e-tourist VISA to avoid the usual hassle of heading down to Little India to get the passport stamped with VISA and return again to collect it.   It was just a waste of time.   The application and approval of the e-VISA was a breeze.  

Upon arrival at Bangalore, there was a counter 'e-Tourist VISA' so I queue up at this location and not knowing whether this was the right location I asked one of the Indian immigration staff and was told to queue at the other end.   The queue was extremely long and by the time I reach the immigration officer, I was told to queue back at 'e-Tourist VISA'.   Very pissed with the whole system, I walked back to my original queue location.   The whole process took slightly more than 1hr and by the time I reach my baggage collection, the baggage collector was carted off my bag.

The taxi to the hotel was also was long, noisy with persistent conning, dusty and stuck in traffic jam at every cross junction.  By the time I reach the Hotel, it took 1hr.  

On the bright side, it was nice to be back at Hyatt Bangalore - the front desk called the manager and was greeted politely with a warm welcome.   The staff of Hyatt Bangalore is one of the best amongst all the travel stays I have made.   They ensure my stay was comfortable and always with a smile on top of the beautifully decorated hotel.

Garlic Nan

We always chose the same dish garlic naan with lamb and chicken curry.   Some habits never change but it remains a good comfort good during our stay.

Tipu Sultan Palace

Bangalore - Tipu Sultan Palace has nothing but emptiness and a small garden for an entrance fee of Rs 100.  

Ground level of Tipu Sultan Palace

The Sultan throne

Surrounding temple

Quite disappointing as there was nothing interesting nor fantastic about this Palace with fading walls and ceiling with vast empty spaces.     In the true sense it was 'tipu'

Bull Temple

Bangalore - A short stop at the Bull Temple.    The temple is a sculptural masterpiece. It is dedicated to Nandi, the bull, which is considered as Lord Shiva's Vahana or vehicle according to Hindu mythology.

The temple is situated in Bungle hill on the south of Bull Temple Road. There is a large sculpture of Bull, which is about 4.6 metres tall and 6m long. One of the distinguishing characteristics of the structure is that it has been carved out from a single rock of granite. We did not enter the temple because I had to take off my shoes.

Bull Temple

Bangalore Palace

Bangalore -  We took a taxi to visit some places within Bangalore as our flights were late in the night.   Bangalore Palace was first on the list of things to see in Bangalore.

Bangalore Palace

Entrance to the Palace

The facade of the Bangalore Palace looks grandeur but the interiors were in need of a renovation with walls and ceiling peeling away.   Much more could be done to upkeep this old Palace to its past glory.

As always foreigners pay more at Rs450 whilst locals pay Rs250.   The price includes an audio guide hung over your head and with a press of a button; the audio provides a walking commendatory of the palace at different locations.

Elephant shot and hung over the entrance

the grand staircase

interior architecture

Cannon 

Cannon coat of arms

Dinner at Zen Restaurant @ The Leela Palace

Bangalore - After the seminar, we took the taxi to Zen Restaurant @ The Leela Palace.  As the name implies, it's Japanese but in fact it's fusion Japanese, Thai mixed with Chinese menus.    The menu displayed 3 sections of various food - Japanese, Thai and Chinese.

Lesley and myself

Both of us having our dinner under the chilly and starry night, dimly lit candles.

Prawns cooked Cantonese way

Plad Thai Khun

Japanese sushi and sashimi platter

Only the preserved ginger tasted awful.  I told the waiter about it and brought me another bowl which tasted just as awful.   The location was good as the distance is only 15 minutes from Hyatt Bangalore and the food is pretty decent.  

Dum Pukht Jolly Nabobs restaurant

Bangalore - Lunch was at Hyatt Bangalore and the strange sense of coincidence is that we ate the same mutton and chicken dish as last year.    We are really a nature of habits.

For dinner, we booked the Hotel taxi to Dun Pukht Jolly Nabobs @  ITC Windsor Hotel.  It was quite a distance about 45 mins ride there.   It was more economical for the driver to wait for us and bring us back to Hyatt.

Dum Pukht restaurant won a number of dinning awards and so I went to taste their fine dinning food. The ambiance was Noble Indian Maharajah style and the waiters were very attentive.  Even a look at them will bring them forward to my table to serve.

spicy Papadum 

Kakori Kabab

Read about this rave dish and also was recommended by the waiter as Chef choice.  The meat was very tender and tasted like liver pate.   I did not like it at all.  I mistook it for Kebab.

Mutton 

Wow! their mutton was full of flavour and really melt in your mouth.   It was so smooth and soft - perfect dish.

Chicken Briyani

The Briyani rice was full of fragrance and the chicken was tender and good.   I like the Indian Briyani being baked unlike in Singapore too much oil and gee.

desert caramel with pistachio

Value for money:  $ as it's very expensive
Ambiance was good and serve in fine dinning.  The waiter are attentive.  

Karavalli restaurant

Bangalore -  Breakfast was complimentary and a very good spread of Indian cuisine.  The waiter at Hyatt restaurant was very good and tended to my every needs, kudos to them for this Indian hospitality.

Dinner was at Karavalli restaurant - a popular Indian fine dining restaurant located at The Gateway Hotel - a short distance from Hyatt Bangalore.   The decor and ambiance of this restaurant brings you back to ancient Indian times.

signboard along the corridor

This restaurant specialise in seafood, so we chose 2 seafood dishes and a mutton dish.

Sungatache Kodi

This is tiger prawns cooked in spicy Indian curry.   There were only 3 medium size tiger prawns fresh and nicely cooked, not so spicy.

Mutton curry

The mutton was very tender and delicious; and the curry was not too hot.

Chevod Blachao

This is a lobster dish prepared in pickle masala with very hot and spicy chillies from Goa; and Goa vinegar.   It was so chilli hot that I sweat was dripping down my face.    The chilli and masala masked any freshness of the lobster meat.  

Value for money:  Too expensive
Ambiance: Excellent
Worth a 2nd visit: I doubt it

Oko restaurant

Bangalore -  Oko that is the name of this restaurant and it received rave reviews and wanted to see this for myself.   I got the front desk to book a reservation for Lesley and myself @ 7pm; also got the hotel car booked as well.   We got down to the Lobby @ 6.30pm but reached The Lalit Askhok hotel only at around 7:15pm due to the heavy traffic.

The restaurant was on the 6th floor of the Lalit Askhok hotel and we were the first guest being greeted by rows of waiter and waitresses.

Apart of the heat, dust and noise - Indian dining experience is a notch above restaurants in Singapore.   We were greeted politely and shown to our seats.  Furthermore, throughout the meal the waiter tended to us asking how was the meal; whether we are ready for the next meal, and a sous chef was always around to chat with us.

This restaurant is big with an indoor concept and a very nice outdoor dining area.  Initially we sat outside but the warm weather coupled with 'unfriendly' bugs made us change our mind.

Outdoor dining

huge outdoor sofas for a relaxing evening

The indoor was good - air condition - the menu is Asian Fusion - Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, Malaysian and Singapore food.    They have a spread of sushi menu but I stay clear of raw food in India.

Soup

Clear soup of Lemon coriander and seafood - it was good with fresh pieces of prawns and scallops.

Grilled lamb

The grilled lamb was grilled and so tender.   The meat was marinated well and the taste was really delicious and succulent.

served Phad Thai

The waiter served our Phad Thai Khun "Thai noodle with prawns".   Very different from the usual Phad Thai with more taste of tomato sauce looking from the colour of the noodles.   It is still a bit spicy but maybe blended to the Indian taste buds.

vegetables

I ordered asparagus and shitake mushrooms initially but the sous chef came and told us that the asparagus was too small and not good - and suggested us a 'customised' dish with green beans, bak choy, taufu instead.   It turned out well a bit salty due to the generous oyster sauce.

Tab Tim Grob

A favourite Thai desert also called 'Red Ruby' - water chestnut wrapped in red sugar, coconut and chilled it with ice shavings.   This desert was too rich and generous in coconut milk.   Half the amount of the coconut milk would have suffice as a good desert.

The Oko restaurant toilet is also a talk of the town....

A very nice decorative toilet which I think the best in India - cool, chic and modern.

Value for money:  Expensive for Thai food
Ambiance: Excellent
Worth a 2nd visit:  Maybe if there are no other food choice