Alive n Kicking: The Kylin Experience (Chandigarh) : Restaurant Review

Wednesday, 1 February 2017

The Kylin Experience (Chandigarh) : Restaurant Review

Winter Mornings, Warm Sun and Weekends. Isn't it an awesome blend? And if you get to spoil yourself with a dine-out opportunity on a lazy Sunday, your day is made.

The last weekend, I got an invite to review The Kylin Experience, Chandigarh that is recognized as one of the finest restaurant for multi-cuisine dining.

Location:

Kylin is located at the third floor of Elante Mall, Chandigarh which happens to be the most sought after hang out places of 'The City Beautiful'. Elante Mall is the second largest mall of Northern India and it's top floor boasts of a spacious food court, an amazing courtyard full of cafes, food joints and restaurants. And here is where Kylin welcomes you proudly with an easily accessible locus. It is quite trouble-free to reach the restaurant.

Ambiance:

The interior of the restaurant is aesthetically designed with exposed red bricks on the walls all over. The walls have got gracefully implanted geometric frames decorated with tiny colourful plants in them which pleases the senses. The restaurant entrance flanked by an alluring Budhha statue kept at a rack marks holiness at the place.

Critical to any restaurant, whether it is casual, sophisticated, rustic or modern, is Lighting. At Kylin, the entire space is sufficiently lit with assortment of multi-coloured pendant lights hung on the ceiling to spread omni-directional glare. Not only the lights are functional to the purpose, but create an intimate ambiance to impress you enough for a return.

One can notice the extra efforts put to combine iron-grill panels behind with colored lights to pull off a richer texture and color.

Seating:
At Kylin, the seating layout emphasizes on the comfort to add to the diner's experience. They have variety of seating options within the allocated area. You may choose to enjoy wall-side comfy seating with wooden partition fixtures between tables or occupy center seats which are space-efficient and encourage conversation during dining.

The line between a restaurant and bar is getting harder to parse these days, so Kylin presents an exclusive high-rise bar-stools arrangement for its bar area on one side of restaurant. The spectacular bar features a great display where one can indulge in watching the bartenders crafting a perfect drink for you. The bar area is well-managed to introduce dramatic lighting from behind the premium liquor bottles to manifest the pop lighting effect.

Food & Service:

Talking about the foodies delight now; I had been invited to taste and review the newly introduced Winter Special menu at Kylin that offers an incredible mix of Soup Meals and Sizzlers.

The cuisine offered at Kylin is an amalgamation of Japanese, Chinese, Thai, Malaysian, Burmese, and Asian, so they guarantee you to offer delicacies beyond the monotonous.

Before I could begin my food tasting session, I informed the Kylin staff about my Vegetarian preference. An usual kind of menu with a wooden base arrived at my table and the head chef himself came to greet and guide me about his dishes. The experienced and friendly chef gave me utmost information about the preparation and ingredients gone into every dish.

For the starters, the small bite-sized portions of Dim sums arrived in cute bamboo basket having Mushroom & Bok Choy, Broccolli & Almond and Tofu & Vegetables variants. The flavour of each filling could be felt in every bite as the aptly steamed, nearly transparent dim sums melted in my mouth.

I demanded my all time favourite Mojito on being asked for drinks, while my son who accompanied me to the venue, got to sip a specially made mocktail by the chef. We opted for refreshing yet non-alcoholic versions, ofcourse.

Moving to the main offerings in the winter menu, we were served these soup meals -

Asparagus & lotus Stem With Dumplings, is a clear broth with vegetables, mushrooms, star anise and rice noodles in it.

Thukpa, is a yellow coloured Tibetan soup with tangy taste with loads of veggies, baby corns and noodles in it. People who enjoy non-vegetarian food can get the veggies substituted with chicken in their Thukpa.

Now this one had been a beautiful presentation indeed. The family-sized serving of this soup is named as Steam Boat. Resembling to a real one, it's one of the finest offering in the menu. There are options to customize the soup with choicest veggies, chicken or sea food as per own liking. You can even enhance the flavours using the variety of condiments served with the dish.

There is no tampering done with the ingredients to bring out authentic flavours of dishes so that they may represent the cuisine they actually belong to.

So we slurped and spooned our way through the restaurant’s finest 'meals in a bowl'. I recommend these soup meals especially to those who prefer a quick lunch and avoid heavy fried food. These soup meals are generously seasoned and don't push you to compromise in either taste or health, rather you feel 'full' and 'content' after finishing one bowl.

For a complete Kylin Experience, we were served delicious Sizzlers in the second phase-

Chilli Paneer With Hakka Noodles, is a full meal prepared with paneer and capsicum with gravy made of combination of vinegar and oriental sauces. It was truly the tastiest accompaniment to the noodles. The deep fried baby potatoes and crunchy bell-pepper in the platter tasted yummilicious.

Another flavourful sizzler variant came all decked up with bowlful of veggies and a huge spring roll sleeping over a bed of hakka noodles and it's named as Exotic Veggies in Ginger Chilli With Hakka Noodles.

I'm usually a more-n-more veggies kind of person who loves to munch veggies really fondly. With many slices of baby corns in the dish, I simply devoured this dish to my heart content.

The sizzlers menu at Kylin also offers variety of non-vegetarian delicacies like Chilli Chicken With Veg Fried Rice and Duck in Orange Liquor Sauce With Flat Noodles.

The chef insisted on tasting his signature dish i.e. Kylin Special Sushi and my son was absolutely delighted to know that chef had a Veg Sushi Platter on his menu for us. Though the attention paid by the staff towards minute details was especially apparent in the presentation and quality of every dish, the Sushi platter instantaneously won our appreciation.

The tiny dipping bowl were filled with soy sauce and dipping a piece of sushi into soy actually improved the flavour of vinegered rice with a bit of savouriness

Concluding the fine dining experience at Kylin with desserts was amazing. The chef presented a trio of homemade icecreams in basil, star anise and coconut flavours which made for an even better dining experience.

I couldn't leave without admiring fast paced service by staff throughout. The service scores full marks for friendly, quick and accommodating experience.

On a cue, The Kylin Experience absorbs the grandeur of the city for being one of best place for casual dining and a must-visit restaurant for lovers of multi-cuisine food. When you visit the place, don't forget to glance at this corner where the extensive awards won by the restaurant are exhibited with pride.