The national capital has a lot of State Bhawan canteens, among which some are open to the public. Like we’ve discovered three months back The Potbelly Rooftop Cafe situated in Bihar Niwas, Chanakyapuri. Similarly, on this day, i.e. 1st August 2018, we went to explore the Goan Cuisine at the Goa Niwas, Chanakyapuri. A private catering firm Viva O Viva manages the canteen.
The casual ambience of the canteen represents the easy-going vibe of the state Bhawan. The purpose of this state-run canteen is to serve authentic Goan Cuisine with affordable rates.
Serving staff were polite to us, and they also had excellent product knowledge. One of them was wearing typical bright Hawaiian style shirt with images of palm trees all over.
We decided to settle with a menu that the servers and the owner had selected would be the best for us to have a comprehensive and wholesome experience of what the restaurant has to offer, with a specific eye on Goan cuisine. And boy were we glad.
We first started out with Prawn Balchao with pao. The Prawn Balchao is in many ways the raison d’être of Goan cuisine and its no surprise that it’s thepièce de résistance of the meal in Viva o Viva as well. Prawn Balchao gravy is a bright red, and the taste is delightfully tangy with the tomatoes and chillies blending together in delightful harmony. The prawn was amazingly juicy and plump. This is the best prawn you can get in Delhi. And if you’re a seafood lover, you know prawns are among the best things to relish.
Next, we were served the Pork Vindaloo. The pork vindaloo was sour and spicy and made a hearty dish. Despite being a curry, it went great with the Pao and was a delicious understated complement to the loud flavours of the prawn. The pork amazingly was largely free of fat and consisted of relatively soft meat. The fatty pieces too went just great with the curry.
Post this; we were served The Red Snapper curry with rice. The fish was insanely fresh, cooked in a light coconut curry, balanced with chillies.
After this excellent conclusion to the entrees, all that remained was to conclude our meal with some superb dessert. The sheer brilliance of the meal had built up very high expectations for the dessert. They served us two variants of desserts. Dodol & Bebinca.
The Dodol is a traditional Goan dessert which is made up of coconut milk and jaggery. This was as a thick and sticky dessert & the Bebinca was a soft fluffy multilayered dessert made of coconut whose flavours it exuded and egg yolk and flour that lent it the amazingly velvety texture. This was the perfect end to our meal. We recommend everyone to visit Viva O Viva when you are in Delhi.
