Ahmedabad

Hi Foodies,
I thought this should be my first post.
http://picasaweb.google.com/jagansayshi/Food/photo#5237327791276963106

Cheers,
Jagan

The look of Swati Snacks is all glass, stainless steel and wooden benches. This gives the restaurant a sense of cleanliness and brightness not usually associated with the traditional Indian snack joint.

The menu is brief; something one appreciates only after tasting the food. Instead of running the gamut of food from Chinese to Tandoori to Continental, the owners of Swati Snacks have chosen to stick to their speciality - simple, healthy dishes from Gujarat and Rajasthan.

My friends and I visited Swati snacks on a hot, sticky Ahmedabad evening. While waiting to be seated in the jam packed restaurant, we had yummy icegolas from the gelato/ice gola counter conveniently located outside the restaurant. The khus,lemon and mint gola we shared was tangy and refreshing; just the right thing to cool us down and cleanse our plate for the meal to come.

Once inside, we ordered panki chatni,dhansak rice and one of the bajra/millet(?) rotis with batata nu shak (that's potato curry) with a side order of chaas each.

The panki chatni, my favorite dish at Swati Snacks, is a lightly flavored rice pancake which comes with green chutney as an accompaniment. It was hot, fragrant and delicious. I highly recommend it.

My friends' dhansak flavored rice and roti were also very good, with distinct flavors of their own; something we tend to miss at the generic eating joints where everything tastes like garam masala.

As we'd already overloaded on the sugar, we gave the desserts a miss, but the jalebi plate at the next table looked mighty appetizing.

Each dish cost between 50 - 75 rupees, which is a bit steep considering the kind of food and the quantity offered. But make no mistake, the taste and the quality more than make up for the price.