Gujarati Food Festival at The Mango Tree

October marks a special occasion at The Mango Tree, and they invite customers to join them in celebrating Navrathri, Dussehra and Diwali by having a month-long Gujarati food festival. The food being completely vegetarian, is rich, flavoursome and is truly a treat.

I am told that the Gujarati palate is quite sweet and even curries aren’t spared! There’s so much variety in one meal, and at The Mango Tree, keeping true to Gujarati style, they serve various curries in separate bowls alongside roti, and rice to be eaten later. Firstly, a snack is served and this consists of dokhla (steamed cake made of rice flour) and a fried vegetable cutlet, both of which are meant to be paired with mint sauce, sweet mango chutney, and a pickle. The dokhla is quite fluffy and light, and quite tasty when paired with the condiments, as is the vegetable cutlet bursting with flavour.

Roti and poori are next, and are eaten with various curries such as a chickpea dhal curry, potato curry, and a potato and eggplant curry. Each curry has a sweet tinge to it but they are all packed with such incredible flavour of the spices used in each dish. Salads are also served, and they are tangy, providing a lovely balance of flavours throughout the entire meal. After I am done with the roti and curries, I am told it is customary to start on the sweet items served, and these would be the aamras (mango pulp), a dish made with semolina and cardamom, and a roti stuffed with a sweet mung filling. The chilled aamras is refreshing, thick and much like mango juice but much thicker while the semolina dessert is light and fluffy with a strong flavour of cardamom. But my favourite is the stuffed roti, which is not too sweet and just right. The mung filling is warm, soft and delicious.

Finally, the rice is served and by then I’m nearly stuffed but the fragrant rice is something I can’t say no to. Two curries are served and they consist of a light curd based curry and another light dhal curry, both of which are very good and again packed with flavour.

Gujarati cuisine involves coconut, jaggery and sugar in the preparations. The Gujarati menu is available everyday for lunch and dinner during the month of October and it is completely vegetarian. A different menu will be available for each day, and it is priced at Rs.1250++ (adults) and Rs.1000++ (children aged between 5-12). A 20% discount is available for 4 pax and more upon a reservation made minimum one day in advance. The food festival has garnered a favourable response from customers so far, and will continue until the end of October.

The Mango Tree is located at 82, Dharmapala Mawatha, Colombo 03.

By Sarah Kellapatha