Overview
- Signature Dishes: Indian chicken dishes
- Opening Times & Days: 9:00 am to 10:30 pm, daily
- Address: 15 Bhatiyani Chohatta, City Palace area, Udaipur, Rajasthan, India
- Contact: N/A
- Reservation: No
Author Reviews[display_rating_item_results rating_form_id=”3″ rating_entry_ids=”1″ show_category_filter=”false” show_options=”true” result_type=”star_rating” preserve_max_rating=”true” show_title=”false” show_count=”false” ]
Total Rating: [display_rating_result rating_form_id=”3″ show_count=”false” show_rich_snippets=true] [accordions load=”1″] [accordion title=”User Reviews” last] [display_rating_item_results rating_form_id=”5″ show_options=”true” result_type=”star_rating” preserve_max_rating=”true” show_title=”false” show_count=”true” show_rich_snippets=true] [/accordion] [accordion title=”Add Review”][display_rating_form show_email_input=”true” show_comment_textarea=”true” show_name_input=”true” rating_form_id=”5″] [/accordion] [/accordions]
Summary
Lotus Cafe Udaipur is a chic little cafe located near the City Palace. It’s specialty is Indian chicken dishes however it also had an International menu option. While it had good reviews, we left feeling disappointed with our non-vegetarian dinner. The dishes lacked flavour and were unappetising.
Lotus Cafe Udaipur
Lotus Cafe Udaipur is an upbeat little cafe located in the City Palace area. There are quite a few cafes in Udaipur; this one caught our attention due to the positive reviews for its delicious chicken dishes. It specialises in Indian cuisine however it also serves up a fare of International dishes such as salads, baked potatoes and vegetarian meals.
As we walked through the door, the first thing that caught our attention was the decor. It’s chic, upbeat and very classy for an Indian cafe/restaurant. It appealed to us as most of the budget restaurants in India don’t pay any attention to the decor in their restaurant.
We really liked the hanging lamps which gave it a romantic atmosphere. In the background, there was soft, instrumental jazz playing which really heightened the mood. The decor was simple yet elegant and was a welcome surprise for us.
[singlepic id=3493 w=720 h=560 float=center]
In addition to the downstairs eating area, Lotus Cafe Udaipur also have a mezzanine level which overlooks the tables downstairs. Seating is on the floor for those who want to relax and loll around on a plush mattress. If you’re interested in eating upstairs, you might have to wait for a while as it seemed to be a popular spot for young people to hang out. For us, we were quite comfortable sitting at one of the tables downstairs.
[singlepic id=3495 w=720 h=560 float=center]
The service here is quite ordinary and what you would normally expect at a cafe. There seemed to be only one staff working here that night so he was quite busy serving all the tables. As a result, the service was a bit slow which was to be expected. It also took a while to receive our meals from the kitchen so I’m assuming they might have limited staff working in the kitchen too. On the plus side, the quality of the English spoken was decent enough so we were able to communicate our requests fairly easily.
Lotus Cafe Udaipur have a blackboard set up on the front wall to list their specials for the day.
For dinner, we ordered two mains – Chicken Dum Biryani with Nuts, and Chicken Sowetta – with Chapattis.
[singlepic id=3498 w=720 h=560 float=center]
First up was Chicken Dum Biryani with Nuts which is a specialty dish from Hyderabad in South India. It is prepared with basmati rice and chicken marinated in Indian herbs and spices. It is a dish that is cooked over slow heat for a long time thereby allowing the spices to infuse into the rice really well.
For those of you who are wondering what ‘dum’ means, it is a slow cooking method brought to India by the Mughals in the 16th century. Half-cooked food is kept in a handi (clay pot) with minimal amount of water. The lid is placed and sealed with a paste of flour and water. The flames are put out, leaving a bed of hot coals. The heat creates the steam which condenses and rolls down the curved walls. In other words, the steam is choked before it can escape, leading to the term ‘dum’.
Unfortunately, our chicken dum biryani was a letdown. While the chicken was nicely cooked and had a bit of flavour to it, the rice was bland and tasteless. Perhaps it wasn’t cooked long enough to allow the spices to infuse into the rice grains. There were a few nuts and raisins in the dish which gave it a savoury flavour. The dish was topped with shaved paneer which some people like however we don’t like raw paneer in our meals. Apart from the well cooked chicken, the rest of the dish was quite average.
[singlepic id=3497 w=720 h=560 float=center]
Sowetta is a spiced curry sauce made with fresh corn kernels. This is a native dish of Rajasthan which can be served with chicken, mutton or lamb.
The menu at Lotus Cafe Udaipur had both chicken and mutton sowetta. We tried the chicken sowetta as we have always been disappointed with the mutton dishes in India. The mutton dishes have usually consisted of bones with hardly any mutton meat which has been really disappointing.
The Chicken Sowetta here was better than the chicken dum biryani. It was very different to anything we have had in India. The texture was different due to the creamed corn being mixed in with the spicy curry sauce. However, we didn’t like the flavour because it was sweet and mild. It didn’t have much spice to the sauce leaving a lot to be desired from this dish.
We believe that Lotus Cafe Udaipur is set up for western palates hence the mild flavours. Unfortunately, bland Indian curries don’t taste great as the main ingredients are missing from the sauce making the dish weak and unappetising.
The other concern we had with Lotus Cafe Udaipur was the small quantity of meat in their dishes. The bowl of chicken sowetta was filled with sauce with about four to five small pieces of chicken at the bottom of the bowl.
[singlepic id=3499 w=720 h=560 float=center]
The Chappatis were the redeeming feature of our dinner at Lotus Cafe Udaipur. They were soft, moist and went really well with the chicken sowetta. Since there was a lot of sauce to the dish, the chappatis worked well as they could be dipped into the sauce.
Despite the good reviews for Lotus Cafe Udaipur, we were disappointed with our dinner here. Even though it was a reasonable non-vegetarian dinner costing us about Rs 300, we would have preferred to have paid more and had a better quality meal. We left Lotus Cafe Udaipur feeling like we hadn’t really eaten any dinner at all.
