A Homemaker's Diary: BonGoan: Restaurant Review

Photo courtesy: Sarani

It was a rain soaked balmy evening when we finally met at Bongoan for our very first restaurant review as members of Kolkata food bloggers and Chef at Large bloggers table. These days with my limited scope of venturing out on my own, I always welcome such gatherings with like-minded fellow bloggers. Especially Bongoan being very close to my place I looked forward to this eve very eagerly.

Bongoan is comparatively a new restaurant which I have been crossing on my way to almost everywhere. The unusual name gets the justification from the cuisine it serves, namely Bengali (Bong) and Goanese (Goan). But it also serves few common Chinese dishes, which have mass appeal.

I have always loved the way the one story barrack type building, with its lights and adornements looked from outside. The interior is quite spacious but is very dimly lit. Which most of the families (including me) with kids would not prefer. But the staffs were very very welcoming and accommodating. I and Archita were the first to reach and promptly on our request they joined the tables to get the seven us sitted comfortably. Next day was fellow blogger and my childhood friend Kamalika’s b’day so I baked a cake for her and our dinner started with the cake cutting ceremony. The Bongoan family provided us with all the necessary matchbox and cake knife and even sang Happy Birthday to Kamalika. Which definitely touched our heart.

For starters we ordered Lottya fry/ Bombay Duck fry (Rs. 120). sesame Fried Prawn in Continental Style(Rs.300) , and Spicy Chilli Baby Corn(Rs.90).

The Lottya fry is a batter fried snacks but the dish was not at all good as the crust was soft and thick, not cooked properly and the fish was quite smelly for our liking. Though the French fries that accompanied it was crunchy and good.

The sesame fried prawn needs a special mention with it's soft juicy prawns and crunchy perfectly fried golden outer layer. Hands down was the best dish in the lot.

With my spice quotient suddenly shooting high I loved the crispy fried chilli baby corn but it definitely was very spicy for most of the others. It was fried to golden perfection with an amazing crunch but the chili paste was too much to handle.

Two of us opted for the chicken sweet corn soup and were badly disappointed. Could not even finish half of the thick lumpy soup.

For main course we ordered Chicken Xacuti, Mutton Vindaloo (Rs.250) , Chicken Xacutti(Rs.200) and Pork Bhuni(Rs.150).

All of us loved the chicken Xacuti, the Goanese special chicken curry which relies heavily on coconut, poppy seeds paste and other spices. The dish with its balanced taste of spices and coconut paired really well with steamed white rice.

The mutton vindaloo as per the other members were very high on vinegar and everybody missed its original balanced flavours, spiciness and taste.

The pork bhuni was a stir fry kind of dish with small bits of pork, fat, tomato, onion and poato again was liked but everybody complained about the chewy pieces of pork fats, which could have been cooked for a tad bit longer to make them soft and melt in the mouth.

The real bummer was the dessert. I having a huge sweet tooth always keep space to try out the desserts and this time I was super excited when the staff informed that they serve famous Goanese layered pudding Bebinca (Rs. 120). We ordered it immediately but was disappointed when it came to the table. They made very thin slices of the baked dessert and slathered it with some sticky caramel sauce. It absolutely missed its gorgeous layers and the divine coconutty aroma. We could not even gulp down a spoonful of this dish and surely when they don’t know how to handle such a delicate dessert they should drop it from the menu.

The Bongoan food experience is nothing to write home about, but I always believe with such prompt and warm staffs they have plenty of opportunities to improve. With so many restaurants opening doors and then shutting down within a short span I really hope they don’t follow suit. They really need to improve a lot on the consistency factor on all accounts of taste, quality and authenticity. Also for such a small eatery with not too many customers they need to speed up the service.

All in all we enjoyed the evening with some hits and misses on account of food but really enjoyed meeting new members of the team.

Bongoan

Address: 817/4, Opposite State Bank, Kalikapur Road, Kalikapur, Kolkata

Contact Numbers: 033 24842480, +91 8420291730
Hour : 12:30-3:00 pm and 6:30-10:30 pm

Air Conditioned

Credit cards accepted

Approximately Rs. 650-750 for a meal for two.

Bar not available

Check out the reviews by other members