E-Mail
Print
tool name
closeBELLINGHAM-The sound of the sitar and the tabla provoke a kind of Pavlovian salivary response for me, because I associate Indian music with Indian food.
My experience with India's illustrious and diverse cuisine is not vast. During a too-long-ago visit to London, I did dine at a wonderful place called the Bombay Brasserie, said to be one of the city's best. But my globe-trotting opportunities have been limited, and most of the Indian meals in my lifetime have been eaten at the India Grill, where owner Santokh Tumber has been presiding for more than 10 years.
The buttery, spicy dishes at the India Grill may not please everyone's palate or stomach, but who could object to their heavenly fragrances? Open the door, and your olfactory lobes will be bathed with the scents of roasting cumin, coriander, cloves and cinnamon, sizzling onion and steaming basmati rice. Take a glance at an Indian cookbook, and you'll find elaborate combinations of spices that give each dish a special, indescribable quality. No one spice ever seems to predominate.
-
Address: 12151/2 Cornwall Ave. Phone: 714-0314 Hours: 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. lunch, 3 to 9 p.m. dinner every day Price range: $10-$16
-
What do you think of India Grill?
RATE THIS RESTAURANT
The menu here is lengthy, and everything is a la carte. But prices per item are low enough to keep a hearty feast within the sensible range, even when you add in the cost of sides of bread and rice.
We usually start a dinner here with an assorted appetizer plate, $5.50. It consists of morsels of sausage-like kebabs, pakoras (battered, deep-fried vegetables), samosas (a meat or vegetable filling inside a thick flaky crust), savory chunks of tandoor-roasted chicken tikka, and crispy papdums, a sort of spicy cracker made from garbanzo flour.
Dinner courses come in smallish portions, but if the quantities of meat seem modest, they come swimming in thick sauces that are both rich and intensely seasoned. The wife and I are not birdlike eaters, but we find ourselves quite stuffed after one meat dish and one vegetarian dish, with plenty of bread and rice to soak up the sauces.
On our most recent visit, our meat selection was lamb vindaloo, $10.95, one of the hottest dishes on the menu. Lamb and potato chunks are stewed in a blend of spices that includes thin strips of fresh ginger.
From the vegetarian column, we turned to one of our old standbys: saag paneer, $8.95. It consists of rich, firm chunks of paneer cheese in a rich creamed spinach base enlivened with fresh cilantro. But vegetarians will find a lot to like here. The menu contains 15 vegetarian dishes. Another favorite of ours is baingan bhartha, $8.95, a rich, tomato-flavored puree of smoked eggplant.
The menu also offers a choice of eight types of Indian bread, baked in the big clay pot oven called a tandoor. We always get the nan, a simple flatbread, $1.95. It's perfect for soaking up the sauce You may want one order per person.
We also generally add an order of peas pullao, $2.50, which is actually a pot of mild rice with some peas mixed in.
On our last visit, our daughters accompanied us, as they always want to do when we visit this place. Although at ages 5 and 9 they have yet to discover the joys of setting their palates on fire, they enjoy the milder seasonings of chicken tandoori, and a $12.95 large order is more than enough for both of them.
You can also sample India Grill's offerings in a $7.95 lunch buffet or at the Saturday farmers' market, but if you haven't been there for dinner, you have yet to experience anything close to the full range of delights available here.
-
Production Floor Lead
Absorption Corporation -
Payroll & Human Resources Assistant
Smith Gardens -
NAC's
Highland Care Center -
District Secretary position
Whatcom County Fire Protection Dist. #14 -
Open Positions
SKAGIT VALLEY HOSPITAL
@Nyx.CommentBody@