The year in which someone got his name nearly right

The Man's name is "Stephen".  He's quite specific about that, not Steve, or Stevie or Stevo, it's "Stephen".  I support that, you should be called your name of choice and not have to put up with other peoples' interpretation or preferences of it.

He likes his spelling to be right too, it's with a "ph" not a "v".  So, when he books anything he always says "Stephen with a ph" and recently he got just that.

Bloody brilliant!

The Pantry and a personal gripe.

Pomegranates are delicious and this season has been the best I remember.  On a visit to The Pantry off Kala Ghoda, in a little lane just to the side of Fab India I found the best pomegranate drink ever.  Pomegranate and sweet lime.

The Pantry is a lovely little place, all pastel colours and teashop retro chic decorated with prettily painted kitchen utensils and other ephemera.

Big windows and white tiled walls create a lot of light and the open kitchen and glass cases full of bakery goods make for a relaxing space.

Food is served on rather stylish teal boards and the menu offers a good range of pies, sandwiches, salads and soups.  Local produce is favoured and there's free wi-fi.

The coffee is good too, very good.

Now to my personal gripe.  The Pantry has signed up to the social media initiative Treetins which encourages strangers to share tables and build relationships.  They have the cute little flags on the table which are popping up in restaurants all over Mumbai. They also have a regularly changing menu and specials.

They also have free wi-fi and throughout the restaurant people were taking advantage of it.

Now I get that it's useful, it helps people keep in touch, it can pass a lonely lunch or snack as well as a newspaper can.  I wasn't alone I was with the man and a very close friend.  I ordered soup, it came first, that's fine,  as a starter it should.  I tried conversation, questions, comments, suggestions, I got only vague grunts in response.  I even offered to let them try my soup! Nothing!  The two of them sat pecking at their phones like demented pigeons.  Eventually, just before their mains arrived they happily turned their phones to me to show how they had updated their status and had conversations with people who were online to say they were at The Pantry.  I bloody KNEW that!  At least they had tagged me into their comments so I knew I hadn't eaten alone!

I should have got up and moved to another table that was waving it's little flag but all the people eating alone were also pecking away at their various pads and phones.

I've decided that I prefer places without wi-fi but I'll go back to The Pantry and beg my companions to stay off the bloody social media at least until the coffee comes.

Mumtaz Indian Restaurant, Saigon

In the interest of fairness I'm posting Mumtaz Indian Restuarant,226 Bui Vien - in the backpacker area.

Me and the man fight over whether this or Ganesh is the best in town and truly there's not much to choose between the food. Ganesh has airconditioning and is a bit spiffier, Mumtaz is friendlier. Both serve very good Northern and Southern Indian food, a great line in vegetarian dishes and for me, crucially, Mumtaz delivers within half an hour.

Happy Birthday Blog

I realised it has been more than two years since I started this, we had a lovely meal at the refinery, not to celebrate the blog, that momentous event passed entirely unnoticed until after the meal but it's a good tenuous link to food pictures.

The Refinery is a nice space, we ate in the courtyard where there are lots of fans and cool shade. The building used to be an opium factory hence the name and the use of poppies as a logo.

Good food, who could find fault with heart shaped cous cous and pak choi that stands to attention? The mashed potato was also heart shaped but my dining companion had already delved into it by the time I whipped my camera out.

Ganesh Indian Restaurant, HCMC

Found on Le Than Thon a recently opened Indian Restaurant. (This was initialy written a long time ago, see the update at the bottom of this post for a more recent review)



The food is very good and I'm particularly taken by their thalis.





Ganesh vies for first place on my list of favourite Indian restaurants in Saigon with Mumtaz in the backpacker area barely winning in the tase stakes but Ganesh wins hands down on the decor front.

Update Edit I've been feeling bad.
I recently had a look at the blog stats, not something I often do, and found that this post was the top hit. I have to come clean and admit that I stopped eating here a long time ago, around the time the dahl started to be sweet, the vegetable dishes started to be over salted and bland and the staff started saying "I'll talk to the chef" when I returned my inedible dishes and still put them on the bill. I tried the Phu My Hung outlet more than a few times, it was equally poor. I'm not saying Ganesh is bad, just that in my opinion it's become dumbed down and formulaeic and probably serving food that lots of people like, just not me. Mumtaz eventually won out for tasty, reliable food but has been surpassed now that Robin the long term manager of Mumtaz has set up his own Baba's Kitchen near the old place. Where do I eat now? Mumbai mainly, it's not a curry restaurant in HCMC but the city in India that I relocated to.