I still remember last year how my friend Deepa and I made a sudden plan and visited chinatown in new york and witnessed the celebration , hooting , cheer & jeer as part of the Chinese New Year. The roads were covered with red confetti’s and the dragon parades were amusing. We visited a small eatery and had a nice meal for 2 in about 40$ while watching TV shows commemorating the day in China. Infact the celebration continued for the next few days and we kept visiting different venues.

This year the memories lingered and we visited chinabistro in indiranagar !

This was the first time I was visiting this place. Luckily, they have had some special menu too. I thought , it’s better to go for dishes from there – as I can any day come back for the regular menu.

We started with fujian crispy veg spring rolls , followed by moo shu vegetables . There was a very unique dish which I absolutely loved – Hangzhou beggar’s chicken. This was not enough – we tasted Ming long spicy BBQ fish .

I guess I alone had an entire portion. The last appetizer we tried was the Phoenix tailed prawns in bird’s nest. The crispy fried prawns were really big even after cooking and really crispy because of the sesame. The spring onion added a different flavour to it.

In the mains we started with braised silken tofu with mushrooms in ginger wine sauce. It reminded me of the huge portion of mopu tofu Deepa and I ate and took back home. There was a surprise dish in the menu which made me wonder – but we loved it : vegetables in SriLankan curry. The prawn otak otak in rempah paste and hints of kaffir lime was the first non vegetarian dish I tried.

They have pot meals which I absolutely loved . Though we tried the vegetarian one , The thai green is a must must try. For non veg – I shall recommend the the Kung Pao fish pot meal.

In India , a Chinese meal is incomplete without a fried rice or noodles. We tried the celery and ginger fried rice and chicken XO hakka noodles .

In dessert we tried the moon cake and the waterchestnut & white fungus cream. All I can tell is – I have never liked any moon cake before ,the way I savoured this. Not even the famous family run places in Chinatown in NYC amused me. But this stroke a chord for sure.

I love bangalore , for this …. It celebrates everything !! Even if it is the year of the rat !