beyond tasty

As I mentioned once before, up until I was around 26, I'd never eaten Indian food... but now I absolutely love it.

And my favourite Indian restaurant on the whole planet... okay, maybe just in Adelaide... is Beyond India on O'Connell Street in North Adelaide. Partly because it was the first place I ever had Indian food, and partly because it is so good.

Doesn't hurt that it's part of the Gay Mafia... okay, maybe not, but the owner is as gay as gay can be... okay... maybe he's not THAT gay... but he's definately one of the family. And the nicest guy as well.

And because I used to go in there quite a bit with my then faghag, and we used to amuse people, wherever we went, he still remembers me. Which is always nice... when you go back to a restaurant you haven't been too in well over nine months, and the owner still remembers you. Course it's just really, really great customer service.

Anyway, part of the reason Ma and I went last night, was that we hadn't been in ages, but mostly because since the last time we did go, they've changed premises, going from the slightly dark and quite small place on one side of the road, to a much larger and brand new place under an apartment block on the other side.

I hadn't even been past the new place since it opened, so when we did walk in it was a massive shock.

It was SO GORGEOUS... first the wooden automatic sliding door, and the Om's carved into stones on either side... then the long onyx bar (I always thought that onyx was black, but obviously not)... and the three gorgeous dancer statues around a pillar... and then the restaurant itself... wood floors, lacquered tables, plush chairs... that whole thing was beautiful.

When we were ready to order, the owner came over to take our order, since it was still pretty early and I think he and the woman who originally showed us to our table were the only waiting staff working at that point. We chatted and complimented him on the new premises and suchlike (and he was so pleased that we like it that we got another basket of papadums while we were waiting) and he let us in on a little bit of gossip, part of which that in the beginning of the new year, their old premises (which he's still kept) is going to be a Nepalese restaurant, Beyond Nepal. I've only had Nepalese food once before, but it's really really nice, so I can't wait for that.

Anyway, we ordered Beef Jalfrezi (capsicum, tomato, bean and onion tossed with beef strips), Navrattan Korma (or the Navratilova Korma as I wanted to keep calling it... mixed seasonal vegetables in a mild cashew based cream sauce) with plain basmati rice and because I'm such a freak for naan... and I think that Beyond India does the BEST naan anywhere... we got Keema Kulcha (filled with spiced mince), Badami Naan (filled with cheese and roast almond) and Roomali Roti ("thin as muslin, baked atop the tandoor").

When it all arrived, it smelled just amazing... and to my surprise the Jalfrezi was much more "Asian" than I was expecting... rather than being meat in a sauce like a lot of Indian dishes, this was very much like a stir-fry, and came out on one of those cast iron "sizzle" platters. It was very nice though.

As always with Beyond India I ended up fairly stuffed, but very satisfied. Two enthusiastic thumbs up from yaniboy!

Of course, now that I've written all that, I'm kinda hungry...

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