During my visit to Puducherry,
My friend and I wanted to try a typical local food. Someone suggested Blueline,
a restaurant in Promenade hotel at Goubert Avenue at White Town. It turned out
to be a continental restaurant with Thai, French, and North Indian cuisine.
Surprisingly there was no typical local cuisine. I was too hungry to look for
another one so we settled on a two-seat table to try what the restaurant had to
offer.
The ambience is very warm and
vibrant. We sat by the large glass window facing the sea front. The view was
beautiful with huge palm trees swinging with the breeze.
I would have loved to sit on
those wicker chairs by the water fountain but the afternnoon was quite warm outside.
Blueline is one of the three
restaurants in promenade hotel, where buffet is served for people staying in
the hotel. It looked like a dining hall with souvenir shop at the far corner.
We couldn’t eat too much so we settled for a la carte ordering just soft drinks,
non-veg salad, prawn dish and white rice.
For a moment, I thought I was in Europe because while we waited for our order to
arrive, we were served breads platter with olive oil and salt. The breads were
freshly baked and they tasted divine. (It was so filling that we could have
easily cancelled out order and walk away) but of course not, we wouldn’t do
that!! ….
I reached nirvana when the Nicoise
salad arrived. Such a fine combination of olives, anchovies, tuna, eggs and herbs
in the bed of salad leaves with tomatoes, green beans, cucumber and onions.
Okay, although the Goan Prawn Curry cooked in kokam and coconut milk did seem tempting with its bright red color, I couldn’t eat because
I was too full. Guess what we did, we packed Prawn curry and rice for dinner. It
was delicious even after few hours as we feasted in our hotel rooms.
I would highly recommend this
restaurant to everyone visiting Puducherry. The staff is very polite and alert.
The quantity of the serving is good and does not create too deep a hole in the
pocket although it is comparatively three times more expensive than normal
restaurant at the end of the lane.
But then you pay for the ambience
and the service…….and that complimentary delicious bread platter too.