Anupam’s Coast II Coast

Note: I lost all my photos for this article when someone stole my phone… waaah

After my disappointing rendezvous with chicken ghee roast at Kanua (a mishap that, I am assured has been rectified), I’d been craving the stuff. I needed a fix, and needed it bad. Good friend and fellow food-lover Dilip Mendens sensed my desperation and dragged me off to Anupam’s Coast II Coast in Shrungar Complex on MG Road. As we climbed the stairs, I could hear The Bangles, Tina Turner, Phil Collins and other Eighties stalwarts playing in my head… this restaurant, was, after all, sitting on the grave of the erstwhile Blue Fox, where we’d frequently eschewed Accountancy and Taxation classes in favor of clandestine day parties.

Kanua: A Revival of Konkani Cuisine

Kanua has an interesting menu card... in more ways than one

When I was first introduced to Rajesh Pai a few years ago, all he had was a notebook filled with notes and drawings in black ink. That, and a dream. Flipping through his book, he excitedly explained to me that he was going to open a restaurant that served only traditional Konkani food. His mission, he said, was to “rediscover, recreate, and revive” the cultural and culinary history of Dakshina Kannada, aka South Kanara. He was going to call it Kanua, after a variety of rice that has, over the years, been replaced by easier-to-grow hybrid varieties.