The venue where flavors are challenged and aromas get detained in the souls of numerous foodies or food enthusiasts is called ‘Tastes of India’. It’s easy to go gaga over this gala food carnival which was very recently held at gateway of the tech den in the city of joy! Before dealing with post-install support of the code or an urgent client call, techies (who are also great foodies!) preferred to visit this holy spot for an instant mood upliftment 🙂 This was the biggest food carnival which was held this year at Nalban on 25th and 26th of February! This was unique in its own way since it had nearly hundred stalls which housed the best and upcoming restaurants in the city, starting from oldies like Nizam’s to promising newbies like The Baker’s Box. It also had several start-ups who are yet to setup a permanent eatery in the city. This was surely an awesome opportunity for these new restaurateurs (who have just started up) to converse with all the biggies in the business and to exchange ideas and views. For bloggers, especially for food bloggers, like me, this was nothing but a piece of heaven! It felt great to be surrounded by so many amazing food joints, and yes, needless to mention many of these places were my favorites!!
Before proceeding any further I would like to thank Mr. Siddhant Jaitha and Shubh Labh Events Pvt. Ltd. for organizing this lovely food carnival in the city of joy. Kolkatans are always passionate about food and events like this can only cheer them up and gift them a soul pleasing experience. We had a similar event few months back as well from the same organizers which dealt with both food and fashion at Swabhumi, called ‘Streets of India’ where I was officially appointed by their PR agency to cover the event. But since there the attention was divided in between food and fashion, I always felt it would be interesting to be a part of one similar event which deals only with food. I wasn’t aware that my wish would come true within next couple of months!
Since this time, I was one of the official bloggers of this gala food carnival – ‘Tastes of India’, I had the opportunity to know this event from a much closer angle, the huge amount of effort involved and the amount of detailed planning that is required to make anything of such large stature come to life. Now, here I would like to take a pause and let you know the list of key organizations or persons without whom this show wouldn’t have been possible – this event was held in association with Zomato and t2. Here, t2 was the official media partner for newspaper Ads, Friends FM was the official radio partner, Siti cable was the digital partner, and Department of Tourism (WB Government) was the associate sponsor. Then we had M-Bar Kitchen as the nightlife partner, X-Factor was the PR partner, Uber was the ride partner, BookmyShow was there as the ticketing partner, Cullinary Commentator was the Advisory partner and Mrs. Prity Poddar was the official food critic for this show, also there was a dedicated team of bloggers supporting this event. I am extremely pleased and grateful that I was a part of this very dynamic team of food bloggers!
Now this two day event was more like an extravagant outing for many since people were almost spoilt for choices! And the atmosphere of this ground was absolutely electrifying! Everyone seemed to be pumped up with so many artists performing on the stage at one end of the ground, Zomato arranging fun games and contests on regular intervals, and of course with so many restaurants all around it seemed fun had no limits – in short, a perfect culinary getaway, filled with friends, fun and frolic! Coming to the arrangements, I must say I was floored by the classy look which this place had to offer, the white shamiana type stalls looked absolutely elegant and inviting! Each stall had the name printed on it in one single font giving the place a uniform look; it looked like a template where anyone can fit in. People seemed to be so ecstatic with these lovely setting and food all around that they simply ignored the scorching heat which was enough to bake us to perfection without an oven 🙂 Overall, the arrangements were fabulous, very organized and well managed. The stalls were well spaced out, crowd control was again perfect and the overall tidiness and hygiene maintained at the ground was praiseworthy.
Now, coming to the notable stalls and the few items which I really liked trying out at their stalls. And I am sure like me, many other Kolkatans loved these items and more. Kolkatans are passionate foodies. They spend a huge amount of money on food and they are extremely happy for it, and yes they should be! So, anything related to food is definitely one of the biggest industries in the city now. Anyway, let’s not digress and let’s check out my favorite stalls first and then the food items I liked. There were close to hundred stalls and my favorites were Skewers, The Baker’s Box, Aminia, BJ’s Sports restaurant, XII Zodiac, Galang Gabaan, Burnt Garlic, The Stadel, The Rollover, Swati’s flavored rasgollas, On my way, No Junktion, The Frozen Tree, Blu – Aauris, etc.
So now I should brief you a bit about the better dishes which I tried during my stay at this place – The real fruit-filled frozen delicacies at The Froze Tree was a joy to have on these scorching hot afternoons! I tried the fruit blast popsicle from their menu which had loads of different fruits frozen inside an icy popsicle. Then I loved the herbed rice and Chicken skewers at the stall called Skewers! The quality was amazingly good and very reasonably priced. The chicken was juicy, flavorful and perfectly complemented the herbed rice. The Icecream rolls at The Rollover counter was another major attraction and I really liked my paan flavored icecream which they prepared from me and my friends!
Then I really enjoyed the Cheese samosa, red velvet cupcakes, cappuccino brownies at The Baker’s Box, they were truly out of the box and amazing, loved them. The various varieties of paan at On my Way was truly exquisite, especially their fire paan is a craze these days. Then I was truly amazed to see so many varieties of flavored Rosogollas at Swati’s, they have close to 200 varieties as far as I know. I tried the black current and the chocolate ones, though the chocolate one was just okayish but the black current one was truly great. Next, I tired the Chicken Tikka Pesto Panini at the Stadel’s stall and it was truly filling and lip smacking, also I found the pricing was very competitive. Also I tried the sautéed mushrooms from the Burnt garlic stall, the mushrooms were tad undercooked though the taste was perfect and that pulled loads of crowd. Then at this same stall I tired the Steamed Fish with lemon garlic butter, this one was heavenly and the price was simply unbelievable for this dish. The steamed fish was damn fresh and flavorful and the mashed potato which accompanied was smooth and creamy! Also would like to mention, there was this food truck at the venue which also pulled a huge amount of customers!
There were several other items which I had tried but I really loved these above items and wish I could get more of those 🙂 It surely gives an insane amount of joy to a foodie like me to get them all together at a single venue. Maybe this is what heaven looks like! I felt as if I am spoilt for choices 🙂 Overall, I liked the event and all the fun we had over there. I would definitely like to thank the entire ‘Tastes of India’ team, Prity Poddar and Siddhant Jaitha for giving me this opportunity to be an integral part to this event as one of the chosen bloggers. And yes, I would treasure that official blogger’s ID card for long, that’s for sure, thanks for all the memories! And for you, my dear readers, even if you had missed this food carnival this time, hope you got a clear idea how this event was arranged and what it was all about, so next time when the second edition of this event comes up hope you all will be there to have a gala time with some awesome food and beverages. See you then!
Will be eagerly waiting for Tastes of India Edition-2.
Cheers!
foodiedada 