Mayuri Bakery

A couple of years ago I visited Mayuri, a delicious east side Indian restaurant, and have since heard rumors of other avenues to experience the Mayuri empire including a deli, a grocery store, and a video store. A recent quest for a cricket uniform set me off on voyage to the Indian flavored area of Redmond near the Microsoft campus, and while driving around I came across what I thought was the Mayuri deli and decided to head in for dinner.

After entering and getting a feel for the place, I lost confidence that we were in the deli. This particular location was dominated by a case of colorful desserts and seemed to be the Mayuri Bakery instead, but there was a savory dinner special written on a board, and a lovely selection of savory condiments on the tables, so my dining companion and I decided to go ahead with dinner. The special was poori, a deep fried flat bread, with some sort of saucy dish to eat with it. I got curried chick peas, and my dining companion got some sort of spinach with potatoes.

Under the fried bread was a pile of chopped fresh red onion, some fresh chili peppers and a wedge of lime. I doused the whole thing in some nice spicy garlic chili vinegar and scooped up bits of everything with the greasy bread. It was tasty enough, but certainly not outstanding.

Our specials also came with some really good, really creamy and sweet mango lasse, and a square of double-layered cake that was so boring even this dessert lover didn't bother eating it.

I guess the slow search for the real Mayuri Deli continues.

Mayuri

Recently took the trip over the bridge to the east side for some Indian food at the surprising Mayuri in Bellevue. I say surprising because it is located in a strip mall and I probably wouldn't have given it a second thought had it not been for the recommendation of an Indian friend, but it turned out to be really delicious.

To begin with, the vegetarian section of the menu was as large or larger than the meat section, which got me off on a nice start. I was in the mood for something rich, and ordered the Navaratan Koorma, which is described on the menu as "Vegetables, cheese and nuts in a mild cream sauce," as a Thali plate that also came with the vegetarian curry of they day, lentil soup, dal and beans, raita, rice and naan. Dining companion ordered the same thing, but with Lamb Vindaloo as the main.


For the most part, the food was all excellent. My Koorma, with soft cashews and satisfying cream, was exceptionally rich and delicious (so rich that I ended up using it more as a garnish for the other little dishes than by itself), and the Vindaloo was described as the best my dining companion had ever had. Everything, for the most part, was well spiced and balanced in that way that makes you think "mmmmm, this is good," without having to think to hard about why exactly. Another nice detail was that most items weren't overwhelmingly salty.

One of my favorite details of eating at an Indian restaurant is the selection of sauces that they bring to the table, and they tend to vary wildly. In the case of Mayuri, they were exceptional. One tasted like spicy tomato cardamom, and the other tasted like toasted grains and coconut.

The only item that didn't really live up to the others was the vegetable curry of the day, which was the contradictory combination of being simultaneously bland and too spicy and salty.

Gulab Jamun, aka fried doughball in sweet cardamom syrup, as the Thali dessert.

Ordering Thali is always fun, but we were seeing some pretty spectacular specialties brought to the tables around us, including things like stuffed thigh sized moong bean flour crepes, and I'd b be curious to sample some more specialised dishes.

Mayuri Indian Cuisine
(425) 641-4442

15400 NE 20th St
Bellevue, WA 98007
www.mayuriseattle.com

Evergreen Indian Restaurant

While in Corvallis, one of our hosts took us to her favorite Indian restaurant (also the only Indian restaurant in town), and it was excellent.

There was a huge emphasis on vegetarian dishes on the menu, and the three of us ate vegetarian. We each ordered a different vegetarian entree Thali style, which, in addition to the main dish, included a wide plate of rice and 5 little metal bowls each full of a different delicious vegetarian Indian specialty.

Our dinner started with a big plate of papadums, the crispy, savory crackers typically made from the flour of legumes and rice. They came with three delicious sauces, one of which was cilantro based, another tomato based, and the third, coconut based.
After we finished the papadum, the very nice and attentive waiter came and replaced the plate with a basket filled with piping hot, buttery naan covered in the delicious charred blisters that come from cooking in a hot hot oven.
I ordered the Lentils cooked with tomatoes with onions, and my little bowls included a lentil soup, some creamy spinach with paneer, curried chickpeas, a dish with cauliflower and potatoes, and a cool yogurt sauce with cucumbers. The others ordered variations on this, and their little bowls rotated around the menu accordingly.
It was extremely delicious. Not too salty, not too heavy, but full of flavour and just enough spice.

Dessert was also included with our Thali meals, and we ordered mango/cardamom/almond ice cream and gulab jamun, the warm little egg shaped doughnuts that come to the table floating in a bath of hot, honey sweetened ghee.
The ambiance was relaxing and quiet and the space was made beautiful with Indian art and decorations. The server was really pleasant and attentive, always coming by to refill a water glass or offer more rice (he even went out on a limb and brought me a new plate of rice, after I had devoured mine but declined any more).

I can see why our Corvallis hosts love this place!
Evergreen Indian Restaurant
136 SW 3rd St
Corvallis, Oregon 97333
(541)754-7944
http://evergreenindianrestaurant.com/

Qazi's

I have a hard time with all you can eat style buffets. I tend to have this nagging feeling that I am not getting my money's worth because I 'm not able to stuff myself with lobster tails and other expensive meat items. This leads to the dilemma of whether I should overeat to compensate... really get my money's worth with an obscene quantity of the most expensive colored bell peppers and salad bar cheese. This solution isn't very satisfying either, because I don't like the feeling of being over fed.

But I find the Indian/Pakistani lunch buffet at Qazis in Fremont to be a pleasant experience, in large part because the majority of the food tends to be vegetarian to start with.

Only half those plates are mine

Qazis is delicious, and has a ton of vegetarian items... pakoras, dahl in various ways, different types of beans, samosas, salads, curried vegetables, rice, creamy sauces, spicy sauces, herby sauces, fluffy warm garlicky naan. You can also order a cup of rich spicy sweet delicious bottomless chai.

Whoa!

Desserts are reasonable too (unlike the vulgar results of self-access to the softserve machine at American style buffets), and tend to include some sort of mildly spiced sweet creamy rice pudding, and chopped fruit. My favorite is the watermelon, which quite possibly takes a bit of a sugar bath before its debut in the buffet table. Everybody has their item that they eat to an "unfair" capacity at a buffet, and I tend to exaust the bin on this one. To my fellow diners, I apologize.

What makes you taste so good?

The whole event costs somewhere around $8, which feels like a pretty good deal for the variety and quality, even if eaten in a reasonable quantity.

Qazi's

Fremont

473 N 36th St
Seattle, WA 98103
(206) 632-3575