Diane S.
Yelp
You know how at home you take something good and common that you eat and then dress it up? Say you decide to treat your tater tots like a stuffed naked potato and load them with bacon, cheese, butter and sour cream, or go healthier and use Greek yogurt seasoned with dill and Greek or cajun seasonings? Today, I had a little time and searched for something that wouldn't charge me $15 or give me a ton of food. Two samosas seemed about right, but as I read about this restaurant and Indian Street food, I saw a popular dish was the Samosa Chaat. I do not know what a chaat is, honestly, and can't tell you if this was a good variance on that theme. I have a list of favorite Indian dishes and tend to search them out. Samosas are also a favorite on that list, as well as sweet lassi. Mango lassis have seemed too sweet to me in the last few years. There are good Indian restaurants in Ohio, and I was lucky to take a cooking class with the owner/ chef of ther one my husband and I used to go to regularly, until my husband's learned to make his own tandoori and kids came along. My skulls were limited to making the tamarind and mint chutney and using puff pastry to making samosas. Mmt favorite is Malai kofta, but also like sag paneer, and naan. If you haven't guessed, I lean toward the mild and the vegetarian, although I'm not vegetarian. Hit food gives me hiccups.
So I'm not an expert but I know a little.
That said, this little gem is easy to find with Google maps, but not visible from ther road, tucked near a large Indian grocery store, and next to a Subway. The parking is limited and quaint with mudholes and a sign asking you not to park in front of the door.
There are tables to the right, booths in a side room to the left. The most beautiful mural of two colorful cars and some balloons make this a magical place and romantic place to eat, although it's not set up to be romantic.
You order at the counter. The menus above the back, similar to a fast food restaurant, but with more entries. One column actually has Chinese selections. They're are also some pizzas worth unusual toppings for the typical American. I saw an Indian pizza place in Ashburn VA, so these areas probably worth checking out. There were photos, but I didn't include those. Better to learn what kind of breading is under them and pick your toppings and go for it.
I went for the samosa chaat, which is read was two samosas smashed with the tamarind and mint chutney, plus some other things, which I assume are the chaat parts, and a lassi.
The owner, which I assumed was taking my order, didn't ask what kind of lassi and handed me one from the glass front cooler. He also said there dish wad medium in heat but he'd do something to help keep the heat down.
Pluses: they keep a lot of mango lassis in this cooler, one guy brought out a tray of them while I waited and restocked, so there's none of the 10-15 min wait like at some Indian restaurants. I did see that sweet and salty lassis were also on ther menu. Couldn't tell if there were any in the cooler. It had some canned drinks in there as well, that I did not recognize.
There was also a comet of ice cream bars with unique flavors worth checking out after that romantic dinner, or a visit with the kids. See pics for flavors.
I didn't have long to wait although I was 3rd in line waiting.
Cost was $10.50. The samosa chaat was in a to go container that was about 6 inches across and full. I asked how to eat it and was told to stir it then eat with a spoon.
I only stirred it slightly in case the heat was in certain items and above what I could tolerate. But I stirred triangular sections as I went. It was very tasty, there was some variety of textures but mostly it was just gunky and slippery and occasionally had something like corn or chick okra textures. I think the gunky parts might be where the samosa wrapper absorbed some of the liquids from other things like yogurt or the chutneys... so it wasn't crunchy. Gunky to me is chunky but moist. So it was delicious, easy to eat, a mixture of things I couldn't identify, but definitely something I'd have again!!
There was a note on the dish: "medium, less cilantro chutney." So maybe their mint chutney had no mint and was only cilantro.
If you like to get authentic, I highly recommend you try this, and find something you've never had before.