A Christmas Brunch to remember !

Rating 4.5/5

We went to Evviva Sky Lounge by chance on 25th December 2015. Our original plan was to go for the special brunch in Momo Cafe as there was live carol singing along with a dedicated kids zone being put up for Kids. We reached there at around 1.30 pm after watching a movie and the place was full of people, probably overbooked and a tad more than the staff could handle.

Consequently the seating, service etc wasn’t in the greatest of shapes and after a bit of a rough time for the half an hour we spent in Momo Cafe we were showered with a special courtesy of their Executive Chef Mr. Pradipt Sinha – to dine at the Evviva lounge for the same terms and conditions as in the Momo Cafe ! We gladly accepted the offer and made our way towards one of the most famous rooftops in the City 🙂

As we made our way to Evviva we were personally escorted by Mr.Pradipt (awesome gesture) and he introduced us to the Restaurant Manager, Mr.Jitendra and rest of the staff and we got hold of the humongous menu on offer.As we were settling down we got to meet Chef Hitesh, he’s the one who treated us with one delicacy after the other when we dined at Momo Cafe the last time we were there and it’s a pleasure to chat with him about food.

The concept of Evviva, Ambience and Service.

I rate them an outstanding 5/5 on all the above parameters.

As explained by the Executive Chef Mr.Pradipt Sinha the concept of Evviva is pretty simple, you don’t go and fetch the food instead the food comes to you ! Right from the starters, mocktails to the main course and their special dessert trolley, all this ensures you indeed have a personalized experience 🙂

As is evident for the concept to work one needs to have an exceptional service and I was extremely glad and touched by the services and outstanding courtesies bestowed on us by the entire staff.

As far as the ambience is concerned I think it looks best during the evenings, however with a little princess I have it’s not possible for me to visit during the evenings since kids are not allowed at Evviva during the evenings. The seating and overall atmosphere though was pretty good in the afternoon as well but it’s best to be visited during the evenings.

Food and Drinks – I rate them an excellent 4.5 on this parameter.

Being a non alcoholic I can only comment on the mocktails and I can say the litchi based mocktail was the best of the lot while the Virgin Mojito was how it should be so no complaints on the drinks part.

The Starters

There were a number of starters that were on the menu but in order to conserve space for dishes to follow we decided to go for a select few like Fish kalimari, squids, chicken spring roll, veg spring roll, bhatti ka paneer, barbeque chicken, veg bruschetta and murgh ki asharfian.

The starters I really loved were as follows:

Murgh ki Asharfiyan – saffron tinged chicken tikka served live on the grill, was really juicy and moist and wasn’t too spicy at all yet pretty good.

Bhatti ka Paneer – very nicely done paneer tikka that had a spicy and tasty marination kept overnight.

Barbeque Chicken – a different take on the usual recipe with an absence of the commercially available barbeque sauce in the preparation.

The Main Course

Nalli Nihari – Amazing lamb shanks preparation where the meat is cooked for hours and hours oozing in it’s own juices. The end result is a meat so tender that you could even use a toothpick to separate it from the bones.

Butter Chicken – The most outstanding butter chicken that I have ever tasted in Pune for a long long time. It was spiced in a subtle manner and not at all sweet as it should be and I loved the preparation with mirchi ki roti.

Bengali Fish preparation – A mustard based fish preparation that was so very tender and nicely done that the fish almost melted in my mouth and though I was more focused on the butter chicken still this dish registered it’s presence in my food palate.

The Murgh Amber Biryani

I am reviewing it separately, a typical awadhi preparation – belonged to the kacchi kind of biryani wherein the meat and rice is cooked together. The resultant was a juicy and moist biryani, as is expected from the awadhi preparations the biryani was aroma based and is very lightly spiced so full marks on the authenticity of the preparation.

Desserts – I would rate them a good 3.5/5 on this parameter.

Without going into too many specifics I felt the desserts were more of a dry cakes type variety and I guess an addition of different variants of pastries and Indian desserts would only improve the desserts part of the meal.

To sum up my experience at Evviva was pretty awesome !

Special thanks needs to go to Chef Akhilesh who manages the Evviva kitchen and has a speciality in the Awadhi Cuisine. He cooked and served all the Awadhi dishes himself and we had a nice little chat about all of the preparations and I would cherish the food conversations I had with Mr. Akhilesh as much I loved what was served. As told by Chef Akhilesh for most of the dishes the spices are prepared in his supervision within the Evviva’s kitchen and the commercially available spices are not used in their kitchen.

I also had interesting conversations with Chef Hitesh about the food, lifestyle of working in hotels etc and it only made our experience even more eventful and I am so very thankful for the same as well.

I don’t have enough words for Mr.Pradipt Sinha for making our Christmas brunch so special and kudos to him for going out of his way and arranging the brunch for us in a special place called Evviva 🙂