Village – The Soul of India, West Block, Amanora Town Centre, Hadapsar Kharadi Bypass, Hadapsar, Pune

A mixed bag of sorts but just the food alone is not worth it !

Rating – 3/5

Go for this if you’re a veggie fan and looking for something more than just an eat out option.
They are a theme based eating joint and when I visited this place they had a Jail theme going on with some interesting costumes.
They don’t have a dedicated dance floor as such but they have lots of space where people can exhibit their dance moves. Usually they play out a traditional dance number and their staff guide the people to replicate the dance moves which was interesting to watch, but only for a while as I was interested in tasting the various food items on offer 😉

Started with snacks, Masaala Dosa was really good and sambhar was just right without being too sweet as is the case with so many eating joints in Pune.
Next on the list was pani puri and though I didn’t taste but my wife liked it. My wife is usually very particular about her Sambhar and pani puri and she loved both the items so full marks on those two.
Next we tried dahi vada and it was ordinary.
There was an aloo tikki starter which was tasty enough to ask for a second helping.
Coming to other starters gobhi machurian dry was fantastic and Paneer tikka was passable.
Masaala chhaas was refreshing and tasty.

I would rate the starters as 4/5.

The main course had many items but I am only naming the ones that had some taste and rest were just there just to tick that mark of variety but nothing much to write home about.
The best of the lot was the Paneer green peas gravy, with Paneer so soft and creamy and the gravy was cooked very nicely.
Daal tadka was with like a real tadka and amply spiced, tasted nice with steamed rice.
The only other noteworthy item was the Veg Biryani, it tasted nice but as is the problem with so many eating joints the Biryani rice gets overcooked over a period of time and in this case it almost started to burn from the bottom. If you take it from the top it still tasted alright.
Rest all of the items in the buffet were rather below average and the Jain Paneer stood out in the worst of the lot category. The major issue here were the raw fenugreek leaves that were added after preparing the gravy and what resulted was a total mess, this indicated a very amateur kind of cooking and spoiled my plate.

My rating for main course is 2.5/5

They had the desserts comprising of the ones below:
Sevanyi kheer 4/5
Moong Daal Halwa 4/5…was made in Desi ghee and had enough of it to satiate my taste buds.
Jalebi 2/5….was awful and I don’t like to waste food but I just couldn’t finish it how hard I tried. It was thick and too crispy till the extent of being almost hard and had nothing going for it.
Gulab Jamun…3/5 the usual run of the mill stuff, nothing outstanding here.

My rating for Desserts is 3.5/5

I would rate their service as 2.5/5, they try to be helpful and courteous but I have seen them making faces while serving on the food stalls(Dosa and pani puri) and I found it really odd as they are part of the same group as Oye Pape next door and the people working here can definitely learn a lot from Oye Pape staff.

For Ambience and overall atmosphere I would rate it as 4/5

To sum up this is a place you can go if you’re interested in not just food but other group activities then this is the place for you. There are some Tattoo makers and traditional items store(for extra charges) within the premises as well to make use of if you like.
However if you’re like me whose priorities are more towards the fact that a restaurant must first look after their primary job which is to serve good food with courtesy and everything else is secondary then you may not like this place too much:)

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