Saturday, October 18, 2008

Anjappar Two Times in One Day

Clockwise from left: nattu koli masala, jeera rice, paneer butter masala, and chicken 65

Yes, I know - I was here earlier today. But the description that I read online about the nattu koli masala drew me right back here for dinner as I wanted to see first-hand just how spicy it really was. I was hoping that perhaps it could rival a good vindaloo, one of my all-time faves.

I was thus a bit let down to find it arriving in a greenish brown color, and honestly not being that spicy. OK - let me qualify that. Yes, it did have some heat and it certainly was spicy from the perspective of all of those other spices that gave it a deep earthy base. But I was hoping for the much cleaner and in-your-face heat of a vindaloo that could rip your stomach apart, and this was not it. I did like the richness of the jeera rice here though.

Actually, one other interesting thing that we did have tonight was what was known as Chicken 65: fried chunks of spicy chicken as a snack. It was also available in other variants, like Fish 65, Paneer 65, Mushroom 65...you get the idea. So what the heck was this "65" deal all about? From what I gathered, no one really knows where the name comes from. Theories range from the year of its creation to the number of spices involved or even the number of days that the chickens had aged. Either way, I didn't really care too much for how dry this one turned out to be.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I thought the name chicken 65 came from the fact that the chicken was cut into 65 pieces...hmm, sounds a bit unlikely now i come to think about it.
I personally do not like chettinad food...isn't north indian SO much better??

Anonymous said...

its prob a localized thing, singapore's dialling code is 65.

Anonymous said...

I read a while ago that Chicken 65 (a very popular deep-fried marinated chicken dish in South India) got its name from its position as the 65th item on the menu card of Hotel Buhari in Chennai.