Special Occasions Deserve Special Places

 

Special occasions deserve special places—and tonight, dinner was definitely one of those occasions. So we headed to Cafe Mezzuna at South City Mall for an evening of good food, good company and, hopefully, some very happy taste buds.

Cafe Mezzuna has one of those menus that makes choosing dinner unnecessarily difficult. There’s just so much to tempt you with that you’re left spoiled for choice, reading through the menu several times before finally giving in to a few favourites.

We started with a bowl of Nachos, the perfect way to get things going. Then came a beautifully comforting Spaghetti Carbonara—creamy, indulgent and exactly the kind of pasta that makes you forget about counting calories for the evening.

For the main course, we went for the Grilled Moroccan Lamb Chops. Tender, flavourful and wonderfully grilled, they certainly lived up to the promise of the menu and made for a rather special centrepiece to our dinner.

And, of course, no special dinner is complete without dessert. We finished things off with a delicate Panna Cotta—silky, light and a lovely way to bring the evening to a sweet close.

A good meal is always memorable, but when the occasion calls for something a little more special, the right place makes all the difference.

Tonight, Cafe Mezzuna delivered just that!

My Big Fat Belly — A Name That Promised a Feast!

 

With a name like My Big Fat Belly, there was absolutely no way I wasn't going to check out the food here!

The name alone conjured up fantastical delicacies in my head—plates overflowing with food, flavours running wild and, naturally, my imagination doing what it does best: getting carried away before I'd even seen the menu!

And then we got there.

The menu was exhaustive, which meant the difficult part wasn't finding something to eat—it was deciding what not to eat. After much deliberation, we started with a Watermelon Mojito Pitcher, the virgin variety, while we continued our rather serious research into the menu.

For the main event, we ordered their thin-crust pizza, the Al-Pacino. And yes, with a name like that, expectations were already running high!

It came loaded with Italian tomato sauce, grilled chicken, a mozzarella cheese blend, bell peppers, Kalamata olives, dry chilli, basil and feta cheese, finished with a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil.

Each slice was like a scene from The Godfather unravelling in my mouth. There was tomato, cheese, chicken, herbs, olives and just the right hint of chilli—an entire Italian crime saga, except this one ended with me asking for another slice!

Alongside the pizza came The Ultimate Juicy Lucy, a burger inspired by Texas. We went for the lamb patty, which was stuffed with an imported cheese blend and topped with caramelized onions, a fried egg, pickles, Texan sauce and onion rings. It arrived with fries and coleslaw.

This wasn't just a burger. This was a burger that clearly had ambitions.

The Classic Herb Fried Chicken Strips with their aioli dip made for a great side, adding some crispy, herby goodness to an already indulgent table.

By now, the big fat belly was beginning to live up to its name.

But naturally, there is always room for dessert. At least that's the theory we food lovers live by.

So we finished with a Blueberry Cheesecake—creamy, fruity and just sweet enough to bring this rather extravagant meal to a satisfying conclusion.

So, did My Big Fat Belly live up to its name?

I'd say my belly certainly thought so!

Good food, generous portions, a menu that keeps you guessing and enough interesting combinations to make you want to come back and explore the rest. Because when a restaurant gives you this much choice, one visit is clearly nowhere near enough.

And now, of course, I have another problem…

What do we try the next time we go back?

Birds from my Balcony

Oriental Magpie-Robin (Copsychus saularis) Adult

I was in my Balcony as usual sipping a cuppa tea, mid morning when a sudden burst of activity on the tree in front got me all excited. I had my camera in my hand in no time and started tracking the Birds. It seemed like an entire colony of them had come out with the Juniors on a their first outing into the Big Bad World. There must have been a dozen or more of these Magpie Robins and you could distinctly see the Parent pair and their off spring in various routines on the tree.

Oriental Magpie-Robin (Copsychus saularis) Baby

Birds from my Balcony

Blue-throated Barbet (Megalaima asiatica)

I was up the terrace supervising some Painting and repair work when I heard a Bird call in the air. I looked around and on the South-East Corner just adjacent to our Building I spotted the bird. I immediately ran down the stairs to my apartment and grabbed my Camera and came back up. After various attempts and angles, once I got closer I managed to get a clear shot of the Bird before it flew off.

I'm keeping this as part of my stories of "Birds from my Balcony"

Mocambo: The Classic That Still Knows How to Sizzle

 

Mocambo is still one of the undisputed classics of Kolkata. Some restaurants come and go, some become trendy for a few years and then disappear, but Mocambo has been doing its thing for decades—and doing it rather successfully.

Just off Park Street, we decided to head there for dinner on a Sunday evening. Sundays are generally a little quieter in this part of Central Kolkata. The roads are less chaotic, the crowds are thinner and the city seems to have finally decided to take a breather.

But Mocambo? No such luck!

Even on a Sunday, the place had a sizeable crowd. Fortunately, we managed to get a table for two and settled in, ready for what was essentially going to be a familiar culinary routine.

By now, we almost have the Mocambo menu stored somewhere in our heads. There are restaurants where you sit with the menu for twenty minutes trying to decode what you should order. Mocambo isn't one of them. We practically know what we're going to eat before the menu even reaches the table!

After ordering a couple of drinks, we started with two old favourites—Devilled Crab and Pepper Crab Devilled.

Because apparently, when you're at Mocambo, subtlety is optional.

Both were exactly what you'd expect from this old-school Kolkata institution—rich, indulgent and packed with that unmistakable Mocambo character. The kind of food that doesn't try to be clever or reinvent itself every six months. It simply knows what works and sticks to it.

Tonight, however, we had a plan.

Steaks.

But not just ordinary steaks.

We decided that today was going to be a Sizzler Steak kind of evening.

So we each ordered a Chateaubriand Beef Steak Sizzler.

And when those sizzling platters arrived, the entire table suddenly became a much more exciting place to be. The unmistakable sound and aroma of a steak arriving on a hot sizzler plate is still one of those little pleasures that never gets old.

There is something wonderfully nostalgic about a Mocambo sizzler. It doesn't need fancy plating, edible flowers or a paragraph-long explanation from the chef. It arrives sizzling, steaming and smelling absolutely fantastic—and that's pretty much all the introduction it needs.

The Chateaubriand was tender, hearty and exactly the kind of steak we had come looking for.

Dinner at Mocambo is less about discovering something new and more about revisiting something you already know you'll love.

And that's perhaps the real magic of the place.

In a city that keeps changing, where restaurants constantly reinvent themselves and menus seem to change faster than Kolkata's weather, Mocambo remains comfortably, stubbornly, wonderfully Mocambo.

And honestly, long may it continue.

Because some classics don't need an update.

They just need a hot sizzler plate.