The “Jewel in the Crown” of Harare’s Ridgeview suburb has to be The Tandoor Restaurant.
By le connoisseur
As it is snuggled in the leafy, less-travelled avenues, we made sure we had our road map and even then made a couple of wrong turns before arriving at Sunrise Sports Club.
The club was fairly active and a good crowd was gathered, presumably to play indoor hockey because they didn’t materialise in the restaurant.
Up a fairly steep flight of stairs, and you’re at The Tandoor. The view of the cricket pitch must be excellent during daylight— I’ll schedule our next visit to coincide with a match! There are two distinct areas making up The Tandoor.
The “smarter” section is indoors, the more utilitarian, complete with pub, is on a big verandah. Blinds cover the open sections so the wind doesn’t whip right through you in the evenings. One of the walls is decorated with flashing fairy lights which I found fairly headache-inducing, and made sure I faced away.
Boasting traditional South Indian cuisine, The Tandoor has a big reputation to live up to and we anticipated a mouth-watering menu. We were not disappointed! What struck me most was the vegetarian selection of main courses; it was comprehensive and if I didn’t love chicken so much, I would definitely have gone for a vegetarian dish.
The starters were many and varied, with chicken the main focus for main courses, although prawn and fish options are available. There is an adequate selection of wine and other alcoholic beverages and soft drinks, but the beer was not icy cold, so we had to use ice.
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In a speciality restaurant, I feel it is important that waitrons are given adequate training in the restaurant’s speciality. Sadly, our waitron had very limited knowledge.
This meant that we were given little to no advice on the intricacies of particular dishes. The descriptions of dishes are comprehensive, but it’s a whole lot more enticing when someone “in the know” rattles off the splendid qualities of that choice. Our waitron served our meal with aplomb, but could have added greater value with a much deeper knowledge of the cuisine offered. Nonetheless, we chose a varied and satisfying meal.
The starters were a tantalising treat for taste buds as we tucked into chicken samoosas (the crispiest, tastiest ones I’ve had in a long time), paneer chilli and sev poori.
I was keen to try the paneer chilli— cottage cheese in an interesting batter and deep fried together with onion and green capsicum. It was delicious. The sev poori were pretty firey and not for the faint-hearted — on the other hand, maybe they would be just the thing for the faint-hearted! This dish originates from the streets of Mumbai, where every bhelwala (street vendor), it’s rumoured, has his own secret recipe.
I think I could easily forgo a main course and substitute it with a selection of gorgeous starters!
Our main courses were served with a side order of rice or naan bread. The lamb curry was succulent and tender with a generous amount of delicious masala gravy. The naan which accompanied it was perfect — so good, in fact, we ordered extra! Chicken tikka masala hit the “hot spot” right on target; the rice helping to calm things down to an acceptable temperature. A tall glass of lassi, the sweet buttermilk milkshake, was called for, and definitely pacified the meal.
The butter chicken masala was a tasty choice for the least adventurous member of our party. Once again, the masala gravy was rich and delicious. I thoroughly enjoyed my chicken biryani; I love the way the rice soaks in all the flavours of the dish. The chicken pieces in my biryani literally melted in my mouth.
Accompanying the biryani was a dish of raita; delicately flavoured and a good foil to the biryani. Side orders of dosa, uthapam and sambhar, the South Indian lentil dish, are available. We had roasted and fried papadams, and liked the roasted ones best as an accompaniment for the meals.
Speciality Restaurant 4 Plates Expect to spend US$20 to US$30 per head Sunrise Sports Club, Ridgeview, Harare
