ITP Indian Travel Places: Food, Travel, Tourism Business Events and Trade Shows
Phone: +912223619393, +919167999246, +919833849313
Address: Chowpatty View Building, SVP Road, Opposite Sukh Sagar, Chowpatty, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Time: 11:30 AM – 11:30 PM
Meals for two: Rs. 1,400
Cuisines: North Indian, Continental, Chinese, Italian, Mexican
Facilities: Home Delivery, Vegetarian Only, Valet Parking Available, Wifi, Vegan Options, Indoor Seating, Kid Friendly, Private Dining Area Available, Serves Jain Food, Desserts and Bakes
It’s the acid test. Does the vegetarian, Jain diner approve of La Veggie’s Jain food? After all, the restaurant’s name itself is tightly focuses and targeted. And when my Jain-diner guest Arun Kumar Vyas is also a famous astrologer, face reader and a phenomenon emerging as one of India’s most followed astrologers on Instagram, our restaurant review becomes even more interesting. We eat our way through the menu. Over lunch with him and his family, we discuss his weekly zodiac sign ‘Vyas Card’ predictions on Instagram, which are popular worldwide. His wife Veena and children Rajvardhan and Parth have been vegetarian Jain diners since birth. Based in Malad, the family is very particular about the restaurants they dine in. And, La Veggie is just the perfect restaurant to get their views over an exciting lunch, peppered with fun facts about face reading and astrological predictions.
La Veggie, Chowpatty, Mumbai: Decor
Located in bustling Girgaum Chowpatty, next to a bunch of pure vegetarian eateries, La Veggie sprawls on two floors. The top floor is a banquet hall. Pleasant, cheerful, well-lit space, black and white flooring et al.
La Veggie, Chowpatty, Mumbai: Decor
The most unpredictable favourite? ‘Pao Bhaji Fondue’. That’s the Jain dish that meets with the Vyas family’s approval. We skewer and dip in the wedges of pao into the fondue of mashed bhaji. It’s amazing how flavoursome it is, in spite of being sans onion and garlic. The paobhaji masalainfuses it with flavour. Delicious corn cheese balls, spongy deep-fried spheres, topped with salsa. Crisp butter khichiya, too. They offer non-Jain dishes as well. Like the creative and attractively presented nachos chaat. Triangles of nachos are vertically stacked with tangy chutneys and chaat. Chatpata Chinese, too. Non-Jain crisp lotus stem, sweet and spicy.
Plenty of intensely flavored and delicious mocktails, from frozen margarita and pina colada to the almost neon strawberry.
Minus Points:
An ambitious menu which zig zags all over the world and attempts to cook global classics in vegetarian and Jain avatars. Falters on many. Hard, biscuity crust pizza with lacklustre toppings. Gloopy overcooked pasta.Tasteless channa bhatura (we try the Jain and non-Jain versions and both are equally lacking in flavor). Over spiced chilli pepper paneer. Ditto for the vegetarian biryani. Over-sweet desserts, No alcohol.
My Point:
Centrally located, this Chowpatty restaurant, serves up multi-cuisine global dishes in their Jain and vegetarian avatars. A few (like the ‘Pao Bhaji Fondue’) pass the taste test, others (especially the continental ones) flounder. La Veggie offers a huge menu of Jain options and that is its biggest USP. However, even my Jain-diner guests will not go back in a hurry. It’s not worth a second visit.
