Restaurant Review –Bohemian Brew, Bistro and Tea Room

Bohemian Brew, (where all kinds of tea are brewed) is a perfect hangout for people who love food, continental or global cuisine, that pairs perfectly with tea. It is modern age bistro and tea room that serves global selection of handpicked, single origin exotic tea.

First thing that attracts you to this newly launched restaurant at Khar is the ambience.

The restaurant is divided into four sections. The outdoor place behind the long bamboo partition has perfect seating for Sheesha and snacks and that leads to a smaller party room where a smaller group can be accommodated enjoying the Sheesha experience.

The indoors have artistic dining tables, beautiful lampshades, with state of art and curios decorating the walls. Two  steps up is the open kitchen and ten steps down leads to a cozy room with low furniture, bean bags, board games and book shelf. (a room where kids can play/read while the family enjoys the dinner upstairs). There are many plug points near the low furniture where one can chill out alone too, with food, tea, laptop and spend many hours without disturbance.

The drama started in the tea kettle as soon as we were seated. Jasmine tea arrived with a beautiful display of scented flowers, a bulb consisting of a bundle of dried tea leaves and flowers, that began to expand and unfurl in process leaving a sweetly floral infusion.

With mood set to enjoy the dinner, the first course of salads arrived.

Sweet and spicy watermelon slice topped with creamy mascarpone and feta cheese. There was a delightful thai flavors of vodka and watermelon juice infused with fennel and crunchy pine nuts

A special tea leaf salad that had Burmese fermented tea leaves salad with fried garlic peanuts, roasted chana dhal, sesame seeds, cherry tomatoes and lettuce.

This was followed by appetisers, one veg and other non-veg.

Spicy cheesy Kaboos had sautéed vegetables with cheese stuffed between two flatbreads and lightly grilled and this was served with a spicy Peri Peri sauce and rocket leaves. The peri peri sauce was excellent.

I ordered Chermoula Prawns- marination of coriander, parsley green chillies, garlic, and lemon and cooked to the perfection. This was served along with homemade sauce which was garlic hinted and side salad.

While we enjoyed the meals, my eyes roved all around the room. The interiors are tastefully done with every detail in its place. Every table is painted with intricately designed doodles. The tables separated by wooden designer mesh partition giving the privacy of dining experience to every diner. Beautiful decorative lamp shades all over the walls and ceiling, gives you the feeling as if you have entered an arabic zone.

It was nice talking to Rahul Desai, Nevil Kotak and Nitesh Raheja, the three partners, who are the co-owners of this beautiful restaurant. Being experienced chefs, their talent reflects into the food. Rahul Desai offered me a second cup of tea. He brought few bottles of tea leaves to choose from. I took in the deep breath to inhale their fragrance. I settled for deep red Hibiscus tea, although I had loved the vanilla flavored tea too, but then I cannot have all.

There is great variety of tea to choose from that range from normal black and green tea of different flavors, to Oolong tea like fugian, milk, gingseng or white like darjeeling, silver needle, assam hand-rolled or infusion like chamorine, peppermint, hibiscus, vanilla. There are other variety like rose, milk, blueberry. They also have traditional Indian teas like adrak-pudina chai, masala chai, cardomom chai. Adrak-pudina-lemon grass chai.

So we continue with the main course. Didn’t want to have Pizza or Rissotto, or sandwiches or burgers, wanted to order something light. I ordered grilled chicken with three peppercorn velonte served on the bed of mash potatoes and mixed grilled vegetables. I loved it

My friend ordered Cottage cheese, steak served with a side ratatatouille provencale and garnished with basil pasto and pine nuts. She didn’t like it much, she felt it was too cheesy and too heavy for her taste.

However, it was a good experience of dining at this restaurant. We promised to visit again with friends and sit for longer hours to enjoy more variety of dishes. The restaurant is fairly priced with about Rs700 per head, which is good enough if the management allows you to sit as long as you wish while sipping tea over board games and inhaling different flavored hookah like a chimney. Choice is yours......

I was there on an invite this time, but I would love to visit again

Address;

Shop 1, Mahesh Apartment, TPS III Road 5, Off SV Road, Khar, Mumbai