Kamasutra

Hello hello! For today's blog, I will be reviewing an Indian restaurant and wine bar called Kamasutra. The restaurant is located along Bayview Avenue, south of Eglinton. I actually ate at Kamasutra 2 days ago, but I got a bit too indulged in my studying to post the blog, so sorry :(. C and I had planned dinner together after he got off work that night, but I actually had no idea where we were going because he wanted to 'surprise' me. When we arrived at Kamasutra, I was really excited to try it out because I had told him a couple days ago that I was craving Indian food! One of C's friends had told him about this place and apparently he had wanted to google it, but didn't want any provocative images to pop up on his laptop (kamasutra...karmasutra..).

kamasutra; image taken from Google

When I entered the restaurant, I was slightly stunned by the decor inside. To your right, you see a dimly lit bar with a large, wooden shelf and a huge sign with the name of the restaurant. To the left were the seating arrangements consisting of dark wooden tables draped in white tablecloths, and matching dark-wood seats. My favourite part of the restaurant's decor were the big fabric drapes that were looped in between the black-painted and inconspicuous air ventilation tubes on the ceiling (talk about double functioning!).The set-up, lighting, and wine-red color theme, gave off a very cozy, yet sophisticated feel.

We were offered a bound menu that had all the food choices placed behind a plastic cover, as if you were looking into a photo frame. The menu was divided into a bunch of subsections in which different dishes were placed according to some system. There were also mini chilli symbols ranging from 1-5 to indicate the level of spiciness. For dinner that night, we ordered 4 dishes.

Complimentary garlic-butter naan
As the title says, this was the complimentary naan given to us for the night (yay!). Since we ordered two types of naan for the night (we ordered a plain one and the garlic-butter one), I think I'll review both of them here. For starters, naan is a leavened, oven-baked flatbread. It is created in a tandoor, which is basically a large and heated contraption that resembles a metal well. The naan dough is smacked onto the side of the 'well', where it is cooked under extreme heat. Though I've eaten better naan before, the one from Kamasutra wasn't bad at all. The naan had a crispy exterior, and a very doughy interior. At times it could be a little too doughy, but considering that I am a fan of doughy foods, I didn't mind (C on the other hand prefers his naan slightly crispier). Though both naan had the same crispy-doughy texture, the tastes did differ. The garlic-butter naan was certainly  more savoury and had a herby taste to it, whereas the regular naan didn't really have any flavour at all.               
Onion Bhaji ($5.95)
This was the appetizer (or sampray-yogika as they called it) that C ordered. They were sliced onion rings that were covered in a batter comprised of Indian herbs and spices. The dish was accompanied with tamarind chutney, as well as freshly sliced ornamental carrot strings. The onions in the rings were thickly sliced, and had a natural sweet taste to them, whereas the batter was very crispy yet doughy, simultaneously. The tamarind chutney that accompanied the rings was basically a slightly viscous and lumpy deep brown sauce that had a sweet and ' Indian spice' taste to it. The onion rings  by themselves were yummy, but were not spectacular, even if the batter had Indian herbs and spices inside. But, combined with the tamarind chutney, the rings had an overall unique taste.



Butter Chicken ($12.95+$3.00) 
Since this was our first time eating here, C and I both wanted to try their butter chicken curry, a dish that we are both familiar with and enjoy eating. The curry itself cost $12.95, but with the addition of three more dollars, the curry was made into a 'dinner', and was served with a bowl of basmati rice and your choice of any naan bread from the menu. Seeing that we had to order naan bread anyway, C paid the extra cost.The sauce of the butter chicken had a tangier taste than others that I have tried before, thus making it also slightly sweeter. Though the picture may lead you to speculate otherwise, the sauce was actually quite viscous and stuck nicely onto the naan bread. The chicken in the curry were not sliced or bite-size, but rather they were large chunks that both C and I had to individually scoop onto our plates and slice to eat since it didn't fit on the naan bread. Though the chicken pieces were indeed tender, I felt they leaned ever so slightly on the dry side, leaving my mouth with a grainy and stringy feel. Since C and I wanted our dish to be spicier, we asked the waiter for some chilies. Instead, he gave us a red, oily sauce that was apparently spiced chili extract. The heat of the chili extract was accumulative and gave our mouths a slight burning sensation the more we ate it. The extract also gave the curry a sweeter taste, which both C and I feel, improved the dish. Overall, though the dish was delicious and could easily beat other restaurants, it itself can also be beaten.

                                                                Saag with Tender Lamb ($13.95+$3.00)
Just like the butter chicken, we were given the option to upgrade the dish into a dinner with the addition of three dollars. The dish, though, differed from the butter chicken in the fact that you had an option on which type of meat/fish you wanted to add inside. The selections were chicken, lamb, king prawns, fish, and veal. Since we already had a chicken dish and I wasn't feeling for any seafood, we settled on ordering the lamb. The base of the dish was a very rich and creamy  dark-green spinach sauce that was sauteed with garlic and green chilies. I have eaten saag before in other restaurants and usually they are quite stringy due to the spinach, but at Kamasutra, the sauce was more like a homogenous lumpy and thick mixture, which made it easier (and more elegant) to eat in my opinion. The saag had a very nice savoury and creamy taste that really suited the basmati rice that was served with the meal. The lamb, like the butter chicken dish, was served in chunks, though slightly smaller. The texture of the lamb was very tender and required little effort to chew. It harbored the distinctive sweet aftertaste that was nothing short of perfect. This was my favourite dish of the night and the quality of the ingredients used were extremely apparent.
Ras Malai ($4.95)
This was the dessert dish that C and I ordered at the end of the meal. It was basically cream cheese flatcakes that were soaked (literally) in a sweet milk syrup and garnished with mini pistachio crumbs. The 'flatcakes' as they called it, were not flat and were actually quite thick and heavy. I wasn't very fond of the dish and the reasoning behind that wasn't because the taste was bad, but rather the texture of the dish was what turned me off. The milky syrup that the cakes were dunked in actually tasted quite nice and it was very light and cool, and had a very nice creamy taste. The round 'flatcakes', on the other hand, possessed an odd moist and spongy texture that somewhat stuck to my mouth, but at the same time, managed to leave my mouth with a grainy feel. I did suspect that the grainy feel could be a result of the pistachio crumbs, but after eating more of the dessert, I decided that there just wasn't enough little crumbs to create such a substantial grainy texture. I've never eaten this particular type of dessert before so it's hard for me to determine whether the texture was due to an incorrect cooking procedure, or if the dish is just supposed to feel that way. Regardless, it was indeed a very odd combination....

the basmati rice that came with the dinner. it had the dry texture that you expect from basmati (VERY different from chinese rice). i assume that the chefs used a stone-pot because of the random pieces of crispy and golden brown rice. the crispy rice grains created a great contrast in texture when you added curry to it. was very nice.

our dishes

while trying to take a picture of the bar from our seats, C decided to strike a pose...

another pose...of him facing a wall

    conclusively.  .   . .. .

food: 8/10
atmosphere: 8.5/10
service: 8.5/10 (very kind waiter, was very nice)
portion: moderate, filling
 price: slightly pricey (<$20/dish)

happy eating!

xoxo,

-A