Vikas Khanna's Twist of Taste Menu Review at SHIRO Worli
The first season of Twist of Taste hosted by Vineet Bhatia was a delight. After the initial nose twitching I had got around to accept the delightfully twisted recipes. Towards the end of the season 1 , I was completely hooked and ensured that I caught up all episodes of season 2.
The 3rd season is now hosted by none other than Vikas Khanna. He is a perfect blend for enabling traditional recipes into international liking per me. Last week, I had the pleasure to taste his latest creations at the SHIRO Worli restaurant which is famous for its pan asian cuisine.
The menu comprised of 7 course of dishes, starting with a wonderfully light and delicious crispy tart with tofu in tamarind reduction.
This worked for 2 reasons, one because it was light and simple more like mixing the indian sev puri with wontons. The fact that it was served with raw papaya salad worked the most in its favor.
This was quickly followed up with panko fried prawns done in our regular coastal style. The asian flavors were little overpowered and one could barely track the fused flavors. To enhance the fusion it would have helped to served it with a warm simple asian style salad instead of the sweet chilly sauce
Next in line were the xacuti masala flavored chicken rolled in rice paper. This worked for many reasons. The rice roll subtlely wrapped the sharp spicy flavors of the xacuti chicken. The lettuce could have been avoided considering it was hindering the amalgamation of the rice wrap and the chicken, but then as a concept it worked pretty well.
The next course was the highlight of the evening, the coconut and lemon grass infused, curry style rasam powder soup. It was indeed a light and refreshing soup which was liked by one and all. The vegetarians and non vegetarians equally enjoyed the outcome.
Once done with the starters, we moved on to the main course, which comprised of prawn curry. This was a combination of the good old kerala stew plus the thai curry. It was again a delightful surprise. The prawns were a little chewy but that could be because they were made to sit in the hot pot for long.
The next dish was something I was eagerly waiting to try. This was a malabar style, fish wrapped in lotus leaf and steamed. Unfortunately it did not work for me for 2 reasons, the masala was too sharp in taste as expected and then it was wrapped in lotus leaf which does nothing to lighten the flavors of the strong masala and ended up making the overall taste pungent and sharp. It could be just me but fellow bloggers also gave it a thumbs down.
A suggestion would be use more indian fish which could overpower the other flavors and lend some sweetness or maybe opt for some other coastal flavors to compensate for the pungent smell from the lotus leaves.
The last dish was the lemon rice with pineapple. The twist was in using garlic flavored rice mixed wit hthe madras curry. The rice used was japanese sushi rice which sweetened the rice. I liked it although the rice was slightly sticky and gave it a little homely feel instead of a fine dine experience.
Overall experience was a beautiful memory to taste the Michellin star restaurateur and I am definitely looking forward to the new series.
Special mention of Shiro and its chefs for creating this artistic twist. We also tasted Shiro's dessert platter which was out of the world and perfect sign off dish to the beautiful evening.
If you are in the major metros then suggest you to catch up on the new menu which is running till 16th Feb 2014.
The menu comprised of 7 course of dishes, starting with a wonderfully light and delicious crispy tart with tofu in tamarind reduction.
This worked for 2 reasons, one because it was light and simple more like mixing the indian sev puri with wontons. The fact that it was served with raw papaya salad worked the most in its favor.
Next in line were the xacuti masala flavored chicken rolled in rice paper. This worked for many reasons. The rice roll subtlely wrapped the sharp spicy flavors of the xacuti chicken. The lettuce could have been avoided considering it was hindering the amalgamation of the rice wrap and the chicken, but then as a concept it worked pretty well.
The next course was the highlight of the evening, the coconut and lemon grass infused, curry style rasam powder soup. It was indeed a light and refreshing soup which was liked by one and all. The vegetarians and non vegetarians equally enjoyed the outcome.
Once done with the starters, we moved on to the main course, which comprised of prawn curry. This was a combination of the good old kerala stew plus the thai curry. It was again a delightful surprise. The prawns were a little chewy but that could be because they were made to sit in the hot pot for long.
The next dish was something I was eagerly waiting to try. This was a malabar style, fish wrapped in lotus leaf and steamed. Unfortunately it did not work for me for 2 reasons, the masala was too sharp in taste as expected and then it was wrapped in lotus leaf which does nothing to lighten the flavors of the strong masala and ended up making the overall taste pungent and sharp. It could be just me but fellow bloggers also gave it a thumbs down.
A suggestion would be use more indian fish which could overpower the other flavors and lend some sweetness or maybe opt for some other coastal flavors to compensate for the pungent smell from the lotus leaves.
The last dish was the lemon rice with pineapple. The twist was in using garlic flavored rice mixed wit hthe madras curry. The rice used was japanese sushi rice which sweetened the rice. I liked it although the rice was slightly sticky and gave it a little homely feel instead of a fine dine experience.
Overall experience was a beautiful memory to taste the Michellin star restaurateur and I am definitely looking forward to the new series.
Special mention of Shiro and its chefs for creating this artistic twist. We also tasted Shiro's dessert platter which was out of the world and perfect sign off dish to the beautiful evening.
If you are in the major metros then suggest you to catch up on the new menu which is running till 16th Feb 2014.
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