The restaurant reviews at Jason and Terry’s Bay Area Reviews are a terrific resource. Based on Jatbar’s listing we ate dinner at Shiva’s rather than Passage to India tonight (all of Mountain View listings). We had a great meal, though I still want to try P2I one of these days. Amusingly, Shiva’s is across California Street from TS1’s office but between being on Atkins, which we no longer are, and a false impression that the place was expensive we always gave it a pass.
For an appetizer we split a dish called Kolhapuri Chat, a Delhi-style potato cake stuffed with chick peas served with a few very light pieces sort of like three dimensional potato chips and tamarind and fresh mint dips; it reminds me a bit of an old fashioned New York knish, just a bit lighter and with different spices. Nice, and the tamarind dip was great spread on top.
Sweetie’s main dish was the yummy Bharawan Mushroom kebab, fresh mushrooms stuffed with minced vegetable and cheese, roasted in the Tandoor oven; the mushrooms had great texture, a sturdy and moist density. I had the Dal Lakhnavi, a roasted lentil sauce with roasted garlic and spices. Mine was spicier but both were really good.
The service was really something too. The waiter was friendly but not in grating way. Our food came out quickly, still hot and for the main dishes he portioned them out on our plates. When we finished a busboy took our dishes and flatware and another used one of those little metal sticks to clear the crumbs. Unlike some places we’ve eaten at around here, the bill came promptly and our waiter watched for me to put the credit card out.
definitely recommended
BillSaysThis 