Highway Bites at The Dining Room, Park Hyatt Chennai

What: Highway Bites at The Dining Room

Where: Park Hyatt, 39, Velachery Road, Guindy, Chennai

When: 9^th – 18^th December, 2016 (only Dinner, 7 – 11 PM)

Street food of a region depicts the food heritage and culture of the place. They are the identity of a country’s cuisine or originality. Each cuisine holds back a story; right from the cooking method to the choice of ingredients you learn about the lives of country’s ancestors. And I can assure that a lifetime wouldn’t be plenty to explore the street food delicacies of places that own a place in our earth. 

So the food promotions at restaurants give a treat to our taste buds by curating concepts and menus that helps us to dine like a royal as well as explore the food from cuisine around the world. Likewise, through their Highway Bites promotions they bring down the street food of various regions to your plates at their all-day diner – The Dining Room for dinner. So here’s how it works, they have setup three live stations and one beverages station from where you can sample the dishes. You can either go for A La Carte or the street food varieties are part of your dinner buffet too. 

The menu in the four food stations would vary every day with street foods from Indian and International regions. And during my visit they had some mouth-watering highway bites from Goa, Maharashtra and Japan. I tried every dish they offered that day and after a pretty long time I left a dining space without any complaints in the taste of the food.

Some irresistible Chole masala served with Samosa, Kachori and Batura. The white chickpea melts in your mouth and the rich, flavourful masala tickles your senses with exciting. The crispy aloo-mattar samosa and moong dal kachori topped with chole masala, curd, mint chutney, tamarind chutney, onion, tomato, coriander and om-podi just symbolised deliciousness. The proportion of each topping was just right and brought the balance in taste to the dish. 

That was followed by the fluffy, crispy yet soft poori which was served with divinely delicious chole masala. 

Moving ahead to the crispy Japanese street food, ‘tempura’. For veg tempura they had Plantain, Spinach, Carrot and Baby Corn tempura and for non-veg it was Prawn Tempura. The piping hot and crispy tempura served with a simple sweet-chilli sauce is a fried delight. The prawn, baby corn and plantain were my favourites that deserved a repeat.

And for the love of Pao, here we head to Goa. After my recent food exploration at Goa I have developed a new love for the Goan cuisine. So it’s all about Pao for breakfast and dinner at Goa; also wherever you venture they will welcome you with garma garam Pao with sabji’s. At this station they had Wada Pao, Pao Bhaji and Raas Omelette. The chutney spread on the pao and the flavoursome potato wada that sat at the centre of the pao was a perfecto. 

That was followed by the rich and buttery Pao Bhaji. The depth of flavours in the masala steals the show. And by this time I was high on food with all that richness yet I couldn’t say no to Raas Omelette. The mild spiciness from the gravy that topped the omelette was yummy on the tummy.

The beverages station offered Mango Smoothie, Sweet Lassi and Buttermilk. I loved them all but mangos are unbeatable forever. Though the lassi was good I prefer a thicker and sweeter version. 

If you are opting for dinner buffet, you have an endless array of salad, starter, main course and dessert. So just to pacify my sweet-tooth I grabbed some desserts but it seemed quite impossible for my appetite to try anything besides the street food counters. The buffet is priced at Rs.1450 INR plus tax and if you go with A La Carte then you can order the dishes from highway bites promotions separately.

Breaking Down Points

Food Variety: They don’t overwhelm you by presenting all the street food and restricting to minimal options let you to taste and experience street food from a specific region.

Taste: It was surprising to know that I loved everything that I ate.

Quality & Quantity: For buffet, it is unlimited and for A La Carte the portions are designed ideal for two people p.s., we opted for buffet.

Price: A meal for two would cost Rs. 2500 INR (plus tax) approximately.

So my Verdict!

Highway Bites at The Dining Room of Park Hyatt, presents street food delicacies from different National and International cuisines. The dishes are part of the Buffet and A La Carte for dinner alone till the 18^th of December, 2016. The sole winner was the taste!

P.S. On-the-house invite for tasting for the Highway Bites promotions at Park Hyatt and the experience is based on the street food promotions alone. Remember, no two person's palate can be same.