With the first dinner club of the season safely digested, all that lay ahead of us was the question in the back of everyone's mind.... would this third innings in 09 live up to the successes of the first two dinner club seasons?
Typically, I spent far too much time agonising over the choice of venue for April, but settled on Indian cuisine and rang to make a booking the week prior (we are polite sorts after all, and like to check on availability and any other idiosyncrasies etc etc. The very polite young woman who answered the phone asked "would we would like a table in the beer garden?" Beer garden I wondered to myself, a) have I called the right restaurant....and b) in this unseasonably early winter we are all enjoying so much, why would anyone besides Alvin want to sit outside??? I was reassured by our host, so sent the requisite sms on the day containing the address and a reminder to wear a warm coat.
Given our aforementioned friend's short turn around the Himalayas during April, the remaining five dc members were shown down a side alley next to the restaurant, and low and behold, we were seated in a marquee that could only have been conceived by the artistic director love child of Benny Lava and Andre R.
Talk about delighted - we were surrounded by families from the subcontinent and had an uninterrupted view of the wide screen on which Bollywood music clips ran continuously - Ojas once again proving his encyclopaedic knowledge of every aspect of the performances.
I must confess to a little trepidation at this point - what would this tremendous dedication to the decor and ambiance mean for the quality of the kitchen??? This is a dinner club after all, and Chiba had been such an outstanding start to the year.... Suffice to say, our luck held out, and we were so involved in the meal, very few photos were taken. Perhaps the photo of the adorable little buckets of rice sitting in the middle of a very messy tablecloth say enough - it was quite a meal, and we went at it with gusto!
Ojas and I are still daydreaming about the Kashmiri naan with nuts and dried fruit weeks later....but really, everything was exceptionally delicious, and according to those who should know, very well executed. Anyone looking for a brilliant night out in this part of melbourne should put Aangan on the short list. Aangan means courtyard, in case you were wondering, not that the word courtyard does the marquee any justice at all. Special mention to the superb and professional wait staff, who coped with our idiosyncrasies as much as we revelled in Aangan's.
Good naan is a serious business! Beth
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