We joined a lovely young couple (she was from Munich and he was from Switzerland) and an American lady for a street food tour.
All the tours we're doing are organised by a company called Reality Tours. The Guides are from the slums but all speak perfect English and are well educated, able to drive etc. It reinforces what we were told on the slum tour we took, that there is a very strong community bond and most young people don't want to leave it despite being educated to a standard where they could probably move onwards and upwards.
Our guide had a bottle of hand gel with him and ensured we all cleaned our hands before and after each 'tasting'. This tour, and the Slum Tour we did on Wednesday are their two most popular ones and take place daily.
First of all we had a veggie snack from a stall at the railway station where we met. It was called a Vada Pav and resembled a veggie burger (the filling was made with a mix of mashed potato and chickpea with lots of wonderful spice flavours). These cost just 12 rupees (12 pence) each
We then took a train for a couple of stops to reach Chowpatty beach at around 6pm
We'd briefly visited this place on the Night Tour but spent longer here trying 4 different savoury veggie snacks and a selection of flavoured kulfi pieces (Indian ice cream flavoured with pistachio, mango and orange).
Chowpatty is very popular once the heat of the day subsides and there's a lovely atmosphere there
making the Pav Bajhi (kind of very spicy veggie/gravy mix with spiced and buttered soft rolls and raw onion/lime juice side dressing)
Then from the veggie food stalls we took a car to a big market where the non-veggie food stalls are located. It was absolute mayhem there and the noise was deafening- a real assault on all senses! Indians blast away on car and motorcycle horns, cyclists ring bells non stop and there are soooo many people around the market area, shopping or selling or moving stock on wooden carts (or carrying enormous loads on their heads). Its the city that never sleeps and takes some getting used to - particularly areas like this.
We've now more or less mastered crossing roads in Mumbai, having done a lot of walking over the last few days. You have to be bold and 'go for it' .... he who hesitates is doomed never to get anywhere.
We briefly stopped to take a look at the outside of another Jain Temple - again intricately carved marble and very beautiful - just a few sections of the carvings.
Then, more food ! but not from this guy who was cooking offal - not to our taste at all
These dishes were fabulous ... the German couple found the dish on the left of this pic a little too spicy for their liking so I got double helpings! But it was all absolutely scrummy
After the savouries we had a 10 minute trek through the market to the Muslim area which specialises in sweets and desserts. I am not a dessert person but we had ice-creams to die for and we all agreed we'd never tasted better ones anywhere. Sabrina (German girl) and I had mango flavour and the others had strawberry, liche and orange.
Then another 10 minute walk for the final desserts which were incredibly sticky, sweet battered/friend things (that looked like dog turds as David put it)! Its a big operation and people were queuing behind us to buy them
Here they are being made ... and the finished sweets are on a tray on the right of the picture
We've found with all the Reality tours, they take much longer than the advertised times. This was supposed to be 5.30pm to 9.30pm but we were out for more like 5 hours - which was nice as we had train journeys, taxis and plenty of walking/sightseeing between the food tasting sessions.
All the tours we're doing are organised by a company called Reality Tours. The Guides are from the slums but all speak perfect English and are well educated, able to drive etc. It reinforces what we were told on the slum tour we took, that there is a very strong community bond and most young people don't want to leave it despite being educated to a standard where they could probably move onwards and upwards.
Our guide had a bottle of hand gel with him and ensured we all cleaned our hands before and after each 'tasting'. This tour, and the Slum Tour we did on Wednesday are their two most popular ones and take place daily.
First of all we had a veggie snack from a stall at the railway station where we met. It was called a Vada Pav and resembled a veggie burger (the filling was made with a mix of mashed potato and chickpea with lots of wonderful spice flavours). These cost just 12 rupees (12 pence) each
We then took a train for a couple of stops to reach Chowpatty beach at around 6pm
We'd briefly visited this place on the Night Tour but spent longer here trying 4 different savoury veggie snacks and a selection of flavoured kulfi pieces (Indian ice cream flavoured with pistachio, mango and orange).
Chowpatty is very popular once the heat of the day subsides and there's a lovely atmosphere there
making the Pav Bajhi (kind of very spicy veggie/gravy mix with spiced and buttered soft rolls and raw onion/lime juice side dressing)
Then from the veggie food stalls we took a car to a big market where the non-veggie food stalls are located. It was absolute mayhem there and the noise was deafening- a real assault on all senses! Indians blast away on car and motorcycle horns, cyclists ring bells non stop and there are soooo many people around the market area, shopping or selling or moving stock on wooden carts (or carrying enormous loads on their heads). Its the city that never sleeps and takes some getting used to - particularly areas like this.
We've now more or less mastered crossing roads in Mumbai, having done a lot of walking over the last few days. You have to be bold and 'go for it' .... he who hesitates is doomed never to get anywhere.
We briefly stopped to take a look at the outside of another Jain Temple - again intricately carved marble and very beautiful - just a few sections of the carvings.
Then, more food ! but not from this guy who was cooking offal - not to our taste at all
These dishes were fabulous ... the German couple found the dish on the left of this pic a little too spicy for their liking so I got double helpings! But it was all absolutely scrummy
After the savouries we had a 10 minute trek through the market to the Muslim area which specialises in sweets and desserts. I am not a dessert person but we had ice-creams to die for and we all agreed we'd never tasted better ones anywhere. Sabrina (German girl) and I had mango flavour and the others had strawberry, liche and orange.
Then another 10 minute walk for the final desserts which were incredibly sticky, sweet battered/friend things (that looked like dog turds as David put it)! Its a big operation and people were queuing behind us to buy them
Here they are being made ... and the finished sweets are on a tray on the right of the picture
We've found with all the Reality tours, they take much longer than the advertised times. This was supposed to be 5.30pm to 9.30pm but we were out for more like 5 hours - which was nice as we had train journeys, taxis and plenty of walking/sightseeing between the food tasting sessions.
Glad your cast iron stomach is back on form and you can enjoy these amazing dishes, no doubt I'd end up hospitalised after just one bite! The Jain temples are beautiful, i dont know if it was the case with these but ones I've seen every pillar and column was unjque - wonderful
ReplyDeleteFood looks absolutely scrummy and David's not wrong about the turds! Must say I love kulfi, so nice. Are the carvings on the temple ivory?
ReplyDeleteHi J
ReplyDeleteWe used hand gel continuously and only drank water from sealed bottles but we both love Marsala Chai and bought this from street vendors everywhere we went. Its served absolutely boiling hot and usually in terracotta cups which are smashed after use, or cardboard disposable cups. But towards the end of the tour we did have it served in glasses a couple of times so really can't be sure how thoroughly they're washed. The street food tour visited 4 different venues which Reality Tours said could be trusted re. hygiene .. but there's Indian hygiene and British hygiene of course. We were both OK all the time in India but David's stomach is slighly 'dodgy' this morning .. but we're home in the UK so his timing was good!
Hi Di
No they're marble - apparently Jain temples are usually built from marble as its not possible for insects/animals to burrow into it plus it stays cooler than most other building materials. We've visited two (briefly as we were specifically avoiding temples on this trip) and both were very ornate and as Jenni mentioned every carved section is unique. We were told that Jains tend to be wealthy!