A Food Station with Asian Flavours - Asian Station, Anna Nagar Chennai

Where: Asian Station

Address: Croma Building, 2^nd Avenue, 2^nd Floor, Anna Nagar East, Chennai

Cuisine: Asian

Like the stars that pop on the night sky, Anna Nagar is glittering with new restaurants and turning out to be one of the food hubs of Chennai. And the new Asian baby at Anna Nagar is Asian Station; they have a pretty impressive A La Carte menu but in terms of pricing the lunch buffet is a great deal. The lunch buffet is available everyday and it was a sit down buffet; but looking at the difficulty with service they are planning to serve the soups and starters alone at your table followed by buffet setup of main course and desserts.

Going back to my lunch buffet experience, every single dish was served to us on the table. Starting with two soup choices the meal follows with five starters, four main course with rice and noodles and seven dessert for both vegetarian and non-vegetarian buffet. The soup choices were Eight Treasure soup and Manchow soup, while the veg option was vegetables and the non-veg was chicken. So our option was Eight Treasure Vegetable and Chicken soup, a light, flavourful and hearty bowl of soup.

The crunchy, sweet yet spicy Crispy Fried Vegetable Konjeenaro was the best vegetarian starter. The flavour of the sauce was balanced perfectly and the crispy vegetables were mind-blowing. The steamed Vegetable Dim Sum with spicy chilli sauce is always a favourite. The Vegetable Wonton Cup Salad with cold vegetable salad tossed in thousand island sauce sitting inside the crispy wonton is a delight in a cup.

The two other vegetarian starters were Vegetable Spring Roll and Chilli Teriyaki Potato; but both of these missed to make a mark in terms of taste. The roll's thickness and raw flavour of the flour was dominating the vegetable stuffing and ruined the Spring Roll's taste. And the crispy potatoes (similar to French fries) tossed in the Manchurian sauce was hard in texture rather than being crispy.

  

The mild sweetness and Sichuan chilli's heat blended well with the moist and juicy piece of crispy fish. The Fish Sichuan Chilli was the best non-vegetarian starter. The succulent prawn in Hunan sauce was finger-licking delicious; the Prawn Hunan with generous sauce is a dish hard to let go and all their seafood dishes were a definite winner.

Prawn Hunan

The three other non-vegetarian starters were Chicken Dim Sum, Diced Chicken Assorted Pepper and Drums of Heaven Barbecued. The minced chicken dim sum and the spicy diced chicken had no qualms in terms of flavour and they tasted good. The chicken drumstick was hard in texture and this dish grabbed the least favourite spot among the starters. By the time you complete the starters, the tummy starts to ache.

Diced Chicken 

And for the main course, the vegetarian dishes came on top with impressive marks than non-vegetarian. The light, refreshing and delicious Asian Greens and the spicy, tangy and appetizing Governor Vegetables were drool worthy. The vegetable's freshness and subtle flavours that didn't ruin the natural essence of the veggies were the key components which made the dish delicious.

The luscious vegetable Dumpling in hot Garlic Sauce was yet another simple and perfect dish that was nailed in terms of taste. The fresh vegetables and dumpling works well with the Vegetable Fried Rice and Hakka Noodles.

Governor Vegetables, Thai Red Curry Veg, Dumpling

But the dish of the day was Vegetable Thai Red curry; the slight sweetness, essence of coconut and crunchy veggies is a perfect companion to the steaming hot rice.    

And then there was Tsinghoi Chicken, Fish Chilli Oyster Sauce, Prawn Hot Basil Sauce and Chicken Thai Green curry for non-vegetarian main course. Undoubtedly the best among the four mains was prawn; the spicy and savoury sauce and the luscious prawns were too good. The sticky oyster sauce and the well-cooked fish didn't have any faults but the flavours didn't stand apart. And the uniformly diced chicken was hard in texture; in addition the tangy sauce didn't appeal my taste buds. The mains were accompanied with Chicken Fried Rice and Chicken Hakka Noodles.

Chicken, Prawn & Fish

Thai curry is my all-time favourite but one could easily mess up the taste if the spices aren't proportioned rightly. And the overpowering sweetness made the chicken Thai green curry taste like a dessert, this dish was a total failure in the complete buffet.

After a really long wait, the desserts made their way. The crispy and sweet Daarsaan paired with ice-cream was a delight. The mildly sweetened and crispy Date Pan Cake, the flaky yet moist Chocolate Brownies, the creamy Mousse and the fresh cut fruits were good addition to desserts. But the dominance of egg flavour in Caramel Custard was a total turn off. Apart from the buffet, we ordered for Asian Station Steam Engine which is a drink that is infused with the flavours of cranberry, orange and spices. The presentation was beautiful and I loved the look of the steam engine; the sharp and bold flavours would either be a hit or a miss and I personally found it okay.

Steam Engine

The buffet gives you enough variety at a reasonable price, the vegetarian and non-vegetarian buffet is priced at Rs.549 INR and Rs.599 INR excluding the tax (including tax the price is Rs.599 INR for veg and Rs.649 INR for non-veg). A total bill of Rs.1470 INR for the buffet and drink.

Breaking Down Points

Location & Parking: They share the same building as Sigree Global Grill and nearest landmark is Mc Donalds. The parking arena is huge.

Ambience: The most loved thing about Asian Station is definitely the ambience. The vibrant colours, the mesmerising decor and spaciously spread dining space is amazing.

Food Variety: Plenty and plenty of choices to select from the menu. And the buffet spread is good but they can work on more meat choices besides chicken and seafood.

Taste: There were a number of obstacles during the food ride, a few of them tasted amazing and a few failed to impress. The taste was good but wasn't mind-blowing and here I am talking about the buffet alone.

Quality & Quantity: The quality and choice of ingredients is remarkable. You shall not worry about quantity for buffet.

Service: As the number of diners increase the service definitely takes a hit and sit-down buffet seems like a tiresome job for the staffs. But still they were really courteous and welcoming to the feedbacks.

Price: Costly. The cost for two is Rs.1248 INR for buffet and by checking out the menu I can guess the A La Carte would cost Rs.1300-1500 INR approx.

So my Verdict!

Asian Station can be a brilliant addition to the locality if they could master the food. The ambience, food variety and quality seems like a positive already. Though there were a few misses, overall the taste was promising. In terms of pricing their buffet is a show stopper and I have fixated my eyes on the A la Carte.

P.S. Remember, no two person's palate can be same.