OMG, OMG, Rats, mice, vermin and food contamination issues?

Chola NYC – Restaurant or Pig-Sty?
Say, is Chola NYC on E.58th St in Midtown Manhattan an Indian restaurant or a filthy pig-sty.

Folks, Rats, Mice, Vermin, Sewage and Food Contamination issues are some of the hygiene problems identified by the NYC Health Department on August 26, 2010 at Chola, the flagship Indian restaurant of Bollywood actor Shiva Natarajan in NYC and the favorite of Indian movie stars like Aamir Khan, Akshay Kumar and Aishwarya Rai.

Do Hollywood stars Harrison Ford and Woody Allen also come to your Rat & Mice place oops Chola, Shiva?

Geez, Harrison Ford and Woody Allen would have a heart attack if only they knew how dirty Chola is!

Chola NYC – Dirty, Really Dirty
Guys, if we’ve said it once we’ve said it a million times – Bollywood actor Shiva Natarajan is irresponsibly careless when it comes to hygiene at his NYC restaurants.

Repeatedly, Shiva’s Indian restaurants get pulled up by the NYC Health Dept. over evidence of rats, mice, roaches and other serious hygiene issues.

In the latest instance, the New York City Department of Health and Hygiene has put out a highly damaging report on Shiva’s Chola Indian restaurant that gives it a massive 40 violation points.

And the report is so damaging that Chola and Shiva Natarajan are both in deep shit.

Here are the Sanitary Violations Highlighted by the NYC Health Dept (Critical violations marked by Health Dept. in Red color):

1) Raw, cooked or prepared food is adulterated, contaminated, cross-contaminated, or not discarded in accordance with HACCP plan.
2) Evidence of rats or live rats present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas.
3) Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas.
4) Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service.
5) Food contact surface not properly washed, rinsed and sanitized after each use and following any activity when contamination may have occurred.

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When it comes to most Indian restaurants in New York City, the question to ask is how low can these shitholes go.

The answer: Really, really low.

Believe us, guys. Believe us.

Shameless Scumbags
First, these Indian restaurants should start hiring real chefs not clueless buffoons who don’t know their way around the kitchen.

Second, scumbags who own restaurants like Baluchi’s (W.56th St) should pay their employees a living wage and stop stealing from diners. Hey, you low-life owner of Baluchi’s why the hell do you impose a gratuity on dining parties of less than four when your menu clearly states in unambiguous language that the 18% gratuity is for parties of four or more. In our lexicon, this is a crooked, disgraceful practice. We are inclined to send a photo of your menu and a copy of our bill to the New York Attorney General’s office to investigate your restaurant for cheating.

Third, wait-staff at Indian restaurants like Baluchi’s (W.56th St)  should be taught the basics like providing clean plates, offering knives and forks with the food, refilling water-glasses and stop texting/fiddling with mobile phones in the dining hall.

Trashy Food
From the salty Chicken Curry to the sour Vegetable Jalfrezi to the God-awful Vegetable Biryani to the sugar-less desserts, Baluchi’s on W.56th St is a nightmare that we wouldn’t wish on our Pakistani or Chinese enemies or even on our bete noire like Abhishek Bachchan.

Our recent visit to the W.56th St outpost of Baluchi’s was our second trip there. A few years back, we entered its portals one evening around 5PM only to find two sleeping wait-staff members who seemed upset at being woken up and rudely told us that the restaurant would open only at 5:30PM.

This time, we walked in for lunch at which time all food items except desserts and drinks are 50% off regular prices.

Not bad, we thought little realizing the horror movie that Baluchi’s kitchen and wait-staff was preparing to screen for us in the next few minutes.

Decent Opening, Poor Middle and Bad Ending
As we walked in, we were greeted by a friendly bespectacled waiter from Mumbai (Kishore?) who offered a choice of tables. The restaurant was mostly empty with just two tables taken when we entered.

We quickly placed our order for appetizers and entrees.

A short while later, a bespectacled waitress in a sullen mood deposited a dirty white plate with black spots on our table (which didn’t have the white table-cloth unlike many others).

And to our surprise, the Pakoras appetizer came in just a couple of minutes suggesting they were just reheated before being rushed out.

The sullen waitress who got us the appetizer never cared to get us our silverware and quickly disappeared. After waiting for a while, we hailed another waiter (the grim-looking, non-spectacled guy) and asked him for silverware. The man looked shocked that we’d not been provided silverware but could still mutter only a ‘oh’ and got the forks and knives and no, he didn’t care to apologize for his colleague’s total indifference.

Never let it be said that the Bollywood actor Shiva Natarajan f*cks up only his Indian restaurants with intolerably poor hygiene.

No sir, no. Our garrulous blah blah blah chatterbox Shiva is determined to prove that when it comes to bad hygiene practices his Thai NYC restaurant is as bad or worse than his Indian restaurants in NYC.

Shiva is what you’d call an equal opportunity serial hygiene offender.

Indian, Thai or wateva, Shiva’s NYC restaurants turn into filthy shitholes that repeatedly fall foul of the NYC Health Department forcing the bozo to pay hefty fines that he then whines about.

Live Roaches in Little Thai Kitchen NYC
Recently, the NYC Health Department came down harshly on Shiva’s Little Thai Kitchen in midtown Manhattan for, among other serious violations, Live roaches in the facility’s food and/or non-food area and inadequate personal cleanliness.

Inadequate personal hygiene, that we can easily understand. You see, Indians, rich or poor, North Indian or South Indian, fair or dark, are for the most part stinking, dirty creatures with a body odor just a few degrees better than wild pigs after a gambol in raw sewage.

All ye schmucks can say what you will but when it comes to dishing out the worst possible food, you just can’t beat these New Jersey shitholes masquerading as Indian restaurants.

Completely clueless in the kitchen, utterly hopeless in the service department and totally remorseless in their overall attitude, most Indian restaurants in New Jersey are absolutely worthless pieces of shit unfit for even cattle.

Their raison d’etre is unmistakable just as it is unpardonable – How to ripoff rape unsuspecting, hapless diners who enter their portals with simple, fond hopes of a decent, nourishing Indian meal.

New or old, big or small, South Indian or North Indian, the motto of most New Jersey/NYC Indian restaurants is simple – Enter at the peril of being horrifically raped.

Somebody, please deport all these bozos back to the shitty country they all fled in hopes of amassing a few silver coins.  By the way, considering that the illegal population of Indians in the U.S. is on the rise may we suggest the Immigration and Customs Enforcement conduct raids on these establishments after an investigation. Quickly, please.

Newest Disgrace
Just when you thought that Oak Tree Road/Oak Tree Avenue area in New Jersey couldn’t get worse for Indian cuisine, comes a new disgrace in the form of Sankalp (on Oak Tree Avenue in the Golden Acres shopping center in South Plainfield) with all the ugly traits typical of a bad-ass NJ Indian restaurant.

As we walked into Sankalp around 1:20 pm there were about six to eight diners in the restaurant.

For reasons that we just can’t fathom, the restaurant’s hostess who was near the cash register completely gave us the cold shoulder even though we were standing right in front of her, did not care to seat us promptly and kept dicking around with some sheets of paper.

Newest Indian Disgrace

We cursed our fate over the indifferent reception from that short little twit in the pantsuit (tight white blouse and black trousers).

Mercifully the wait was not long as a passing waiter noticed us standing and asked the girl to attend to the waiting customers.

The short little hostess twit then condescended to show us a table by the wall and handed us a lunch buffet menu but not before first inquiring what we’d like to drink.

Aha, she was playing the usual Indian restaurant trick of getting us to order some stupid, ice-filled expensive drink. Ha ha ha, we’re too much of cheap desi SOBs to fall for such cheap tricks.

The lunch buffet menu card basically contained details about appetizers of the day – Alu Tikki and Fish Pakora and the number of vegetarian and non-vegetarian entrees and rice items included in the buffet.

The hostess then brought a water jug and filled our glasses. While pouring water she inquired whether our party was vegetarian or non-vegetarian. We told her that our group consisted of both strict vegetarians and non-vegetarians. The hostess listened attentively and informed us that appetizers would be served at the table.

Just as she’d informed us, an amigo waiter brought the appetizers to the table – four Fish Pakoras and two Alu Tikki pieces in about six minutes after the hostess took our order.

Trashy Restaurant
Holy Christ, the vegetarian and non-vegetarian appetizers came on the same plate.

Only a trashy, shitty restaurant like Sankalp would dare to serve vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes on the same plate to a party of Indians even after being told there were vegetarians in the party. To make matters worse, one of the Alu Tikki pieces was atop the Fish Pakoras. Disgusting scumbags.

The only other occasion we were served meat and vegetarian items on the same plate was at that blabbering Bollywood bozo’s restaurant Dhaba in NYC.

Urgent note to Sapphire waiters:

If you cannot smile at diners, get out of the restaurant business.

Get out. Comprende.

Hey grouchy desi, yes we mean you, the tall, dark, balding (??) black -suited waiter/partner in a surly-mood at Sapphire NYC, if you find it so painfully hard to smile at your paying customers then go find another vocation. Maybe, try the horse carriages around the perimeter of Central Park.

When you charge $14.95 for a buffet lunch that other NYC Indian restaurants provide for better and at lesser cost, then the least you can do is offer a welcoming smile, even if it’s a phony smile. Comprende, schmuck.

Slip Betwixt the Cup and the Lip
Located on Broadway close to Columbus Circle, Central Park and the Lincoln Plaza movie theater, Sapphire had long been on our agenda but we’d invariably linger on in Central Park till it was way too late.

This time we went early and were at Sapphire just after noon.

By golly, the place was already crowded. Not a bad sign, we thought.

Alas, life is a series of slips betwixt the cup and the lip.

Hellishly Bad Non-Vegetarian Fare
If Sapphire proved anything at all, it’s that crowds at a restaurant are no guarantee of quality and lamebrained creations from harebrained chefs are rife in Manhattan Indian restaurants.

Tandoori Chicken was hellishly bad.

With absolutely zero or little marination, it was the worst Tandoori Chicken we’ve had in our life.

Beyond palatable and nearly inedible, Sapphire’s Tandoori Chicken was a  grotesque perversion of the real thing.

We cursed everyone we could think of – Sapphire’s chef, the waiters, NYC Mayor Bloomberg and even Obama that life should be so unfair as to offer us such hideously under-seasoned, under-sexed Tandoori Chicken.

Chicken Tikka Masala, a boring, badly-prepared fixture at most NYC Indian restaurants, was a mediocre offering here too.

Set in a thick, flavorless gravy, the chicken pieces had such a forlorn look and such a forbidding bland taste that we forsook it quickly.

Lamb Vindaloo was hellishly hot.

It is true that Vindaloo is cooked in a hot sauce but the problem here was that chilies had been recklessly flung into the cauldron to the utter absence of other spices in proportion resulting in an awful time for us.

Stay away from this impostor

Vegetaian Stuff – Mixed Bag
Never let it be said that Sapphire’s kitchen is found wanting only with meat dishes. These clowns are equal-opportunity offenders.

Alu Gobi, with the humongous Gobi pieces, was a bland, tasteless monstrosity.

SI: What about our Masala Chai?

Desi Waitress: Very Sorry Sir, I told the cook Masala Chai but he made Masala French Fry!

SI: What! (Sotto Voce: Goddamn Jesus ‘Mother F*cking’ Christ. Is your kitchen staffed with baboons who can’t even understand another desi?)

White Waitress (in a pleading voice): Sir, would you like to have the Masala French Fry?

SI: No, thanks. (Sotto Voce: Have you completely taken leave of your senses, you moron. What do you think this is, McDonald’s)

Desi Waitress: I will get Masala Chai in 1 minute sir.

(So-So tasting Masala Chai arrives 7 minutes later.)

Spoiled food (onion-potato filling in the Masala Dosa was way past the “Eat Before” date), clueless kitchen, un-Vegetarian friendly practices (more on that later), and mediocre service make Dakshin off RT-1 in Iselin, New Jersey one of the trashiest Indian restaurants we’ve been to in New Jersey.

Folks, Dakshin is not a restaurant. It’s a f*cking zoo run by a bunch of baboons, both in the kitchen and in the dining room.

Restaurant or Zoo

Serving spoiled food to diners like Dakshin did to us is an unpardonable, heinous sin for which there are no excuses.

Bad/tasteless food is common at Indian restaurants but spoiled food is still the exception. Except, of course, at dumpsters like Dakshin.

Once a restaurant places spoiled food before diners, it demonstrates its total contempt for paying customers and nothing can salvage its reputation for us. Not even if they were to offer us ambrosia later.

Overall Poor Fare
Hard and tasteless, Idli was unworthy of its name.

The outer layer of the Medhu Vada was crisp but alas, it was only partially cooked inside and had the taste of raw flour.

With Red Chili Powder floating on top, the medium-thick brinjal-carrot Sambar was low on spices, low on Tamarind and extremely low on a competent chef’s hand.

Peanut Chutney and Tomato Chutneys were both cold and flavorless, a problem encountered at most Indian restaurants in the NJ/NY area.

Masala Dosa was soft with spoiled potato-onion filling inside. Absolutely Disgusting.