Nantha's Kitchen @ La centrale culinaire

My buddy Nantha is having pop-ups on top of pop-ups on top of pop-ups. And they awesome pop-ups. He's making people discover his cuisine through freaking delicious meals. And it's fun to be the one reaping the benefits. Yass. Nantha invited me to his pop-up at La centrale culinaire last Friday for a Malaysian/Thai/South Indian food feast. I loves me a good feast!

La centrale culinaire is located in the Mile-End in a random building that boasts a bunch of companies and spaces that are either empty for shows and such or equipped for food making and such. The centrale is supes cute, with hanging lights and a friendly atmosphere. On top of it, Nantha is just always happy and smiling and it's oh-so contagious.

It was a 5 service dinner (ya, we're totes fancy) for 50 bucks. Well, I mean, I didn't pay, but you know.

Tom Yum soup. I really do have a soft side for this soup: the flavor combo is a winner in my book. You know, the book of Marie! Everything about this was good. It had the perf mix of hot and sour. It was perfectly hot (I despise it when my soup is cold. DESPISE) and just the perfect amount of spicy.

Pad Thai. Who dson't love a good pad Thai? It was hot, it was spicy, it was garlicky! I enjoy le garlic, but Margo has somewhat of an intolerance to it and the waiter had told her that there wasn't 'much' garlic. Yikes. As soon as he put the plate down, I got a whiff of it. With just a bit of a lime squeeze, it was perf. With the lovely Thai basil (possibly my fave herb alongside coriander) in there, and the shrimp, it made for a great pad thai. YUM!

Rojak salad: pineapple, cucumber and jicama, in a soy, lime, and sriracha sauce with some roasted sesame seeds. This was refreshing, and, hello, a fruit salad made savoury? YES! It was tangy and sweet at the same time with a hint of spice!

The thali! I loves me a good thali! The dahl was ubs taste and one could say it was almost smoky. The blue rice. Yes, you read correctly, mam! Found in Malay cooking, butterfly pea flower is a superfood on top of being a natural food colorant. It was quite weird, yet, cool, to eat freaking blue rice! It was a tad overcooked, but the flava still came through and it was goood, Then, there was turmeric rice, which just hit my mouth with a punch of flavour. Ya, that's a thang. After that, there was the chap chai which means ten veggies: soy sticks, black fungus, mung bean noodles, and pak choi. The soy sticks had absorbed all the wonderful flavour of the sauce (toasted sesame oil and oyster sauce) and it practically tasted, AND had the texture of meat. Quwhat! Everything else just went so well together. I believe what I wrote in my notes was 'wow'. I think that sums it up. The chicken was really tender in something that tasted stew-like.

Le dessert. We actually asked to share dessert. because I thought I might just burst. Seriously. You know the feeling when you eat WAY too much and you can't breathe no more? THAT. I'm chucking it up to the carbs I'm not used to eating. Filled me right up. Black sesame and red bean ice cream. Yes AND yes. I could have this every day. They were both crisp tasting. You know? Like, not watered down. Argh, you know? Point is it was delicious. 

Service was aight. I mean, the guy was supes nice and answered all our questions AND brought us water and a bucket for us to put our wine in. But our plates did stay too long on the table and service got somewhat slow. In his defense he might've been alone, which, man, I feel you dude. Been there done that. I, by that, I mean I suck at waitressing and even if there were only two tables, I'd start to panic. And therefore, I salute you, sir!

And now, the scores!

Food: 8.5
Service: 7

I'm definitely going back to another one of Nantha's nights!

Cari Mela

Cari mela is literally right around the corner from my house. It's really a mystery why I haven't been before. I just...I don't understand it. I went with my girl V, who is a big fan of the Indian persuasion, a couple weeks back, for lunch.

The place itself, like a lot of Indian restos, is nothing special. Dark room, old tables and chairs, crap on walls. That sums it up, I think. We got there for a late lunch and had not realized that they close again at 2PM until dinner time, so our lunch was cut short a bit, which kind of sucked. But hey, we should've checked! My bad!

We had the midi table d'hôte, starting off with the dahl, a lentil soup. This was such a great soup. WOW!!! The lentils, the coriander; so fresh!! Really... wow! There was a hint of lemon that added a bit of tartness and went really well with the lovely coriander. God, I love coriander. If I could marry it, I would. I would've ordered another if it wasn't a dish that was about to make me fart up a storm. Ps: gym peeps, I'm sorry, it was me.

The vegetarian thali. I loves me a good thali. Usually, I have the non-veg one, but this time, I didn't really feel like eating le chicken. Don't get me wrong though, butter chicken is oh-so-effin-good! That was a sh*t load of rice though, damn! The chick peas were perf and the coriander, once again, was so fresh! Seriously, I'd eat a big bouquet of that, any time. Just imagine a big rabbit, but instead of a carrot, it's coriander. Anywaaaaaayyyy. The eggplant was uber tasty but salty AF. Damn! The boiled veggies were very good but I thought they could have used more spice.

The naan. I'm serious when I say this was the best naan that has ever touched ma lips. Ever. It was so buttery and soft. Basically, what dreams are made of.

Dessert. I'm not going to say much about this. I WILL say that they had just taken out of the freezer and mine was still... frozen. Everything was just wrong.

Service was very quick and efficient, like in most Indian restaurants. GO GO GO! $$$! Hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it!

And now, the scores!

Food: 8 (let's just NOT take that doughnut into consideration)

Service: 8

Well, I can't NOT go back: they are my neighbours AND they have the best naan. Hello.

Maison Indian Curry

Isa and I wanted to try a new indian resto after getting our eyebrows did on Jean-Talon. We always go to Bombay Mahal so it was time. Oh, it was time. So we decided on Maison Indian Curry, just a tad east of Bombay Mahal.

It's quite a big restaurant but it was pretty much already full at 7PM and got even more full after that with a big line up even going passed the front doors. They have huge tables and they don't even bother separating them so you end up eating beside other people which, I guess is an experience on its own. The place feels a tad retro with a multicoloured waterfall thang on the wall. Man, I should have smoked a good one before! Ha...haha...just kidding.

So, we were dying to compare this place to Bombay Mahal. Therefore, we ordered what we would normally order at the other resto: 1 vegetarian thali and one non-veg thali please! But since we were starving, we also ordered two samosas to start off with. Yum! They were soft, spicy and had two sauces to go along. One was prune-y and one was minty. they were excellent. AND huge!

Samosas!

The veg thali had cheese cubes in butter sauce. It was excellent and tender. Seriously and surprisingly, I think it was my fave out of the two plates. The veggies were spicy but not TOO spicy for Isa :p The nan breads were really good and soft. On the non-veg side, the chicken tandoori was really moist and tasty with just the right amount of spices. The butter chicken was, I thought, more tender than the one at Bombay Mahal but according to Isa, the sauce didn't taste like butter as much and wasn't thick enough. Then, on both thalis, there was this tapioca thang. I think we missed the point of that and pretty much left it all in the plate.

As for the service, well, they were really, REALLY busy... all running around! Good thing was that they gave us a pitcher of water from the get go so at least we did not have to bug them for that! Apart from that, they didn't really come and check if we liked our meal and were too busy running around.

And now, the scores!

Food: 7.5 (I think with all the elements, it's equal to Bombay Mahal)
Service: 6.5

A nice cheap dinner (cost me, with taxes and tip, about 13$), but don't bring a date there! The guy beside us had brought his and it was so loud, they had to repeat every sentence!