Puff, Puff what puff do you choose? Yes, I have been faced with this dilemma, time and time again. This happens when you expect guests to come home for tea. This puts you in a predicament that you need to serve up quality snacks. A Muslim hold has quite a few options

1. Chicken Puffs
2. Cutlets - Chicken, Fish and Mutton
3. Curry Poornum aka Patties - Chicken and Mutton
4. Samosa - Chicken / Mutton

Either two of these or go all out and put them all on the plate and impress your guests. When going all out its quite difficult to prepare them all in your house. In that case or when you are running short of time to plate up items its easier to buy readymade food stuffs of the shelfs.

So doing a part-1 round up of just the puffs. All the above the pictured Puffs are Chicken and were consumed at the same time after heating em up in a microwave for 30 seconds. So this eliminates all the bias. Pictured along with the puffs is Pound Cake from Jenne Ferrer


First up I had the Chicken Puff from Jenne Ferrer. Jenne Ferrer is located behind Ega Theatre, Kilpauk. The puff looks fantastic, the best looker of the lot. It does not crumble one bit. So your guests are bound to appreciate the aesthetics when plated up. There ends the pluses. The taste was totally burnt, did not have any layer of flavour. Priced at Rs 35/- I am not sure if this is worth a buy. Your guests are going to talk about the burnt food you served them for a very long time.

Taste - 3/10
Price - 1/10


Next I had the Puff from ever famous Mc Rennett Bakery which has stood the test of time, way before all your French Loaf, Cake Walk, Cake Square and your Hot Puffs. They ruled the roost. The absence of other cheaper bakeries initially gave them complete monopoly on the price segment also. Today they are a middle player. Coming to the puff. It looks completely anaesthetic. It breaks away very easily and crumbs all over the plate. Had a tough time plating it for the photo. But there ends the negatives. It is loaded to the brim with the filling. Whats more important, the filling was moist and flavourful. Something which your guests will like and will talk about for days. Priced at Rs 20/- it is definitely worth a buy. Mc Rennett Bakery is located at multiple locations in Chennai. This was picked up from the Anna Nagar outlet.

Taste - 8/10
Price - 8/10


Finally if I did not bring the ever famous Hot Breads into the equation it would not be a correct comparison. The puff looks much bigger than the rest here. Crumbs up a little bit. But the ratio of puffs to filling is a little off. I felt the puff bit was a little more than the filling. One bite no filling in it. Next bite and then comes a little bit of filling and the third bite you get the full load of filling. Filling was quite nice, but a little spicy for my liking. I did like the puff, but the filling was not as moist as the one from Mc Rennett. Some might like this. I did like it but not to a greater extent. Hot Breads has many outlets all over the city. I had picked this up from their Kilpauk outlet. Priced Rs 35/-, it is somewhat a value proposition.

Taste - 7/10
Price - 7/10

I have not taken other bakeries such as Hot Puffs, because they are not up to a certain standard which one would venture to serve your guests.

I have not mentioned any further details about the cake as I would do compare in the upcoming posts.

Disclaimer : I paid for them

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*A review about a place holds good only for 6 months as there can be a change in quality and quantity of the food, the service and the staff, due to reasons best known only to them. So kindly consider these factors while visiting the places.

Food:
I have always imagined and wished a coffee shop brings in dishes which one would see in an English sitcoms. I don't mean the regular Sandwiches and Pastas, but different items. This is the first cafe I have come across in Chennai, to serve Churro. Just like the ones Joey had in Friends! The churro was served with a drizzle of caramel sauce and chocolate sauce on the side. I would most definitely return just for these.





They serve a variety of shakes and their Lindt Chocolate shakes are to die for. I had the Cafe Latte. A true latte lover in me wanted to sample em! The brew was perfecto! They serve up some delicious sandwiches as well, if your in the mood for a quick bite. If you were to order one, I would truly recommend the brown bread sandwich over the regular ones.




They have a big block of a chocolate cake which resembles the tiny cake at Sandy's and a tasty Waffle. A small talk with owner gives me an idea of what is in store for the future. I had a small idea which I passed it along to the owner who seemed to be on the same page as me. A savoury waffle such as Waffle burger! :P Yes that would be different.

Ambiance:
Cozy and neat ambiance!

Price:
The price points here is very reasonable. Infact seeing the price of Lindt Chocolate shake I was shocked that I had paid a similar amount at another cafe in 2008. It should cost around Rs 300/- for two.

Munch Cafe is located inside the DLF building diagonally opposite to Apollo First Med, Kilpauk.

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On a rainy day in Chennai, when I was on my way home from college, I decided to stop  for a few minutes since the rain was a killer. I searched high and low for a place with no trees around to park the car,  as I had seen a few trees fallen on top of cars.  After searching for a bit in Anna Nagar, I found such an open spot  opposite to Titan watch showroom. As I parked the vehicle, I saw this shop which looked more like a Fag Shop. But it had a name board which read: R.K. Beeda Center.

Since it was raining, I decided to head to the shop and have a hot Chai. But to my bad luck, the power was down in that area, so his Chai vending machine was down too. Just as I wondered what to do next, I saw rack of Puffs. I asked the person on the other side of the counter to get me a puff. He asked me, which one did I want,  the Plain Puff or Vegetable Puff or the Cheese Puff? As he said Cheese Puff, it started ringing some bells in my head. So I asked him for a Cheese Puff and I waited as a Passive Smoker, as people around me were burning their money away.

After a quick cut here and a quick slash there on the Puff, I was given my Puff. One bite of it and I realized that this was more like a Bhel Puri topped with Cheese put inside a puff. I felt it was very innovative use of puffed rice and sev in a puff. Coming to think of it, its a Puff inside a Puff :P. And I just loved it.

The Cheese Puff is definitely worth a try if you do not mind walking up to a shop filled with people puffing smoke. Priced at Rs 10/- for a puff its well worth a try.

Food - 7.5/10
Ambiance - If a group of people smoking can be counted as Ambiance then you have a very good one.
Service - NA
Price - 8/10

R.K.Beeda Center is located in a lane diagonally opposite to Mc Rennet Bakery

Spl. Mugs and Spoon

Spl.Braille Menu

Closer Look at Braille

Donut and Veg.Sandwich

Hi guys. I was out the other day, with a couple of CFG members at a very special, one of a kind cafe called Kalakkal Cafe. This cafe caters to the needs of people very unlike us..the differently abled.

When I reached the cafe, Ricky and Satish had already met and they were waiting outside for me to join them. We walked inside clueless as to what to expect. This cafe has been modeled for differently abled people. It had ramps and slopes which facilitated the entry of the differently abled people.

When we went in and met the people we did not know how to interact with them.Thankfully, people over here are very friendly and they come up and talk to us. We spoke with Anuradha who is a teacher for spastic children and also the volunteer for the evening. She begun by explaining to us how this whole concept came up. She told us that the differently abled people found it very difficult to getting into the regular cafeteria and restaurants, the menu and also trouble with the food.

She explained to us the solutions which they have made, to make life easier for them. Accessibility - build ramps or slopes around the place, Menu - put pictures and also made it with bright and dark colours, also Braille for people who find it even more difficult, Food - easy to hold cups with two handles and also spoons with large handles on them. Most of the solutions seem very simple and can be easily adopted for use in regular cafeteria.

She further told us that the cafe is in a physiotherapy room which doubles up as a coffee shop on the 2nd and 4th saturday of every month. Most of the people who run it, are volunteers. We asked her if they had a tie up with any cafe or restaurant. She mentioned that this is a new concept which is being implemented for the first time in Asia. It made me really proud to know that, something of this kind is being started in Chennai. She informed us that Cafe Coffee Day is interested in adopting this concept into its cafe chain.

We made a couple of friends with the people present there. Santhosh who had finished his schooling a couple of years back, is looking to start a business with a couple of his friends. He is looking to make plates with the use of beetel leaves. We also met Deepak, who has finished his PG in journalism. He is totally into cricket, supports CSK in IPL and also a big fan of Sachin. Somewhere between making new friends and talking to Anuradha we were joined by Karthick Ganapathi and his family.

On the fun end of the Cafe, we saw a couple of volunteers who played music on the guitars and keyboards. They kept the people really happy and entertained. They played remixes of some popular songs.

The food at the cafe is sourced from Winners Bakery. I shared the food with Ricky and Satish. We tried the donut, veg.sandwich and the puff. The food tasted simple and good.

I actually went in for the food, but came out making some new friends. Definitely a great place to go if you have the heart to make a difference in these people lives. I was really moved by people in the cafe.


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