New Shanthi Sagar Vegetarian Restaurant, Bangalore

With just 25 minutes available until my next meeting, I asked my driver in Bangalore today for a good nearby lunch suggestion. He pointed me to New Shanthi Sagar, a chain of vegetarian restaurants in this area that he assured me was pretty good. After waiting a while amidst the busy lunchtime crowd, I finally got a seat and ordered some pani puri and masala dosa.

Unfortunately, most of it was a bit of a bore. The pani puri, while cool in that you got to assemble it yourself (including poking a hole in the shell), wasn't anything too spicy nor exciting. The masala dosa similarly was a yawner, despite its crunchiness. I'd much rather go to Raj back in Singapore instead.

This was a bit odd, especially considering that nearly everyone in there appeared to be local (and hence presumably lending credibility to its authenticity). And if that were really the case, then this was just too mild for me. I did hear afterwards that this place is actually known for just being a cheap place with high turnover, so I dunno if the taste of the food was that high of a priority. Well, at least it was cheap at only 110 Rupees (US$2.70), including a milk shake (apparently mango lassi is not that common here since mangoes are seasonal, unlike back in Singapore).