Panchavati Gaurav - Review

Panchavati Gaurav,

Kumar Pacific Mall

 

The first time I’d been to Panchavati Gaurav was for someone’s party, organized at the Bhandarkar road outlet when I was just in school. I don’t really remember it in detail, but I do remember not liking it as much as I used to like going out to other restaurants. 

This outlet situated on the second floor at one corner of this mall, is a relatively new one compared to the original one in Pune. We expected it to be full being a Sunday, but were surprised to find quite a few tables unoccupied. The Kumar Pacific Mall, on the other hand, was FULL with people. 

A famiy had arranged a small function here as most of the tables were occupied by them. The service was rather slow, we entered at about 8 pm and they started serving us about 10 minutes later. Usually, at such thali places, there’s no time for you to say no when they start serving, so maybe this was a plus point! First came the chutneys – green and red (tamarind), then came the papad to which we said no.  A welcome drink – jaljeera was served. It was very minty but was refreshing. For snacks, there was tirangi dhokla which was tasteless. Small, fat samosas were quite okay, they just had a light masala potato filling which was average. Chaas was also served but I did not have it. 

There were four vegetable preparations – aloo (huge chunks in masala curry), paneer (small pieces in a rich gravy), gatte ki sabji and veg. kolhapuri. All the preparations were good, but I personally did not appreciate the huge aloo pieces. Chapatis, rotla served with ghee and masala puris were being served constantly. 3 bowls were to be filled with sweet dal, tikhi dal and kadhi, of which I had only the tikhi dal. Unfortunately and quite predictably, this dal was the same one used for dal bati. The small shapes in which the bati was offered here was something I’d seen for the first time. The taste, however, was nice and I helped myself to another serving. Moong dal khichdi was runny as I’d expected and offered a fitting end to such a heavy meal. 

Orange halwa, angoori basoondi and jalebi were the sweets. Orange halwa was just sooji halwa flavoured with orange but it was a fresh combination of flavours. Angoori basoondi was disappointing as the angoors were few and far in between the probably skimmed basoondi. Jalebi was fresh and crispy and we enjoyed it by dipping it in the basoondi ! The servers were slow but were attentive and enquired every now and then. 

Panchavati Gaurav