Ashraya International Hotel — Restaurant in Bengaluru

2 stars based only on today's experience. In another time I would have given 4 stars for just the food. After a long gap of two years or more, I so looked forward to my Bengali lunch today. I hoped to get some shorshe fish, of hilsa if possible. But my experience today was spoilt by the manager right at the start, at the booth outside the restaurant door. Before we entered, he hurriedly said they are serving ONLY BUFFET, NO ALA CARTE, and each buffet is 920/- whether veg or non veg. My vegetarian spouse wasn't too hungry and had planned to eat only a light meal, but decided to accompany me anyway so that I don't miss my Bengali food cravings. There was a poster for Hilsa festival at the restaurant, and yet the buffet didn't serve hilsa. The items for the fest are only in an ala carte menu!

Before we could clarify anything, the manager just rushed off inside and vanished. Anyways... we went in, got a table and started serving ourselves. Because of the 'BUFFET ONLY' clause, my spouse had to pay extra just for a simple and light vegetarian meal. As we were eating, a Bengali family came, all in traditional attire, and sat right next to our table. And they ordered ala carte. I was surprised. So I called the manager and asked why ala carte for them? Very cooly he said when ther restaurant is crowded they do only buffet, and later, near closing time they take ala carte orders!!! What??!! So basically, he decides which customers should eat buffet and which customers the ala carte. But if they have such a policy, he should have told us, and we could have come later. We were there at 1:30, we could have waited till the so-called 'ala carte time'. Why did he make a decision for what kind of meal we should eat?! On being asked why he didn't tell us about this earlier, he replied we can 'come TOMORROW (Monday)....as it will be less crowded'. Seriously! He just assumed that we'll have all the time on a week day, and that too tomorrow, for a leisurely restaurant lunch. Because I wouldn't let him go, and held him with a cold steely gaze, he stuttered and said IF he has done anything wrong he's sorry. "IF"???!! I continued my silent gaze. Then he finally accepted sheepishly that it was wrong of him and he is sorry. I said ok and let go. I hope he remembers the fact that the customers coming there are not coming and lining up for free food, he's not doing anyone any favour, and however crowded the place is, it is his duty to WELCOME people or at least inform them clearly and politely of the situation. That's his job for which he has been trained (I am hoping) before joining the hospitality industry!!

And after all that, the buffet didn't help much. I was craving for some good shorshe fish. But there's no shorshe at the buffet, only ala carte menu has that. There were two fish items in the buffet... a rohu in a spicy red gravy which strangely tasted bitter though the fish itself was good, and batter coated tiny fish fingers (pabda fish I think) which were good, though not like eating a good fried fish. The chicken leg piece I took was hard and dry like cardboard, but the gravy was ok. The prawns in mild gravy were tiny and little stale, but the mutton was good. Vegetarian items were all good. I loved the Sheem paturi and methi alu, and luchi was good too. The baigun bhaja was good though much smaller and thinner than previous years.. The dessert was satisfactory, except for the malpoa which was dense and lumpy. I liked the kheer, rasgulla, vanilla ice-cream, and watermelon. I think today I liked the watermelon more than the rest of the dessert items, probably because it cooled me down after the fiasco. Normally i don't touch fruit dessert. Today I had several slices of the watermelon.

In summary I went dreaming of Shorshe ilish, and came back burping a mixture of bitter rohu (which is actually a sweet fish variety), watermelon and vanilla ice-cream.

Sorry Oh Calcutta. I had some good memories of you over the past 15 years....

Oh Calcutta ! A cry that comes out deep from heart of any Bong when they are settled at a Faraway place , away from home. The cry is a helpless rememberence of many things the Bengali misses , food being an important one and Oh Calcutta! of Church Street , Bengaluru, definitely tries to bridge the gap on this front . Went there for lunch on a busy Saturday when we were hungry but food was the least priority as too many things needed to be taken care of. Hence we skipped buffet and even skipped the urge to splurge in the.ilish festival We ordered a simple no frills lunch of Gobindobhog chaler bhat (Steamed rice made from a fragrant ,nutty short grain variety), Kanchalonka murgi( Chicken in green chilly ) and Daab Chingri( Prawns steamed in tender coconut) I craved for the Gondhoraj and Litchi mojito but due to unavailability , settled for Aamporar shorbot ( Roasted raw mango squash) Starter was complimentary , and when I asked for the bill at end, to both of our surprise, two plates of 3 different desserts , we're served to us , courtesy the staff... I am floored and it effectively shut up the man from grumbling about price. Which restaurant does that ? Even two benarasi paan at the end of the meal, complimentary 😊

Ambience : Cool, calm and relaxed . Good for kids and family Service : Polite and humble people around . People who would make you feel home tuned to your every need on the table. A five star from me. Price - It's a fine dining restaurant with a great service not a takeaway or a food joint or a self serving food court. Considering all that I find a bill of Rs 1234 for our order, reasonable . Food : Awesome and brilliantly authentic , the food here would surely transport you to the bylanes of Kolkata and the famed kitchens of yore. Starter was Aloo chana with tomato salsa and mayonnaise like Raita . It was so good I had to shamelessly ask for a second helping of the complimentary dish ! Daab Chingri , with tiger prawns steamed to perfection, was creamy , mildly sweet with just the exact balance of mustard and subtle hints of chilly. A delicate dish that was made with supreme care as was evident from every bite we took. The flavor profile was amazingly balanced. Kanchalonka murgi - I have had it in many places including my favorite Esplanade, but I have never tasted such a brilliant version. Boneless chicken pieces in a green chilly sauce that has just the correct undertones of coconut and coriander , without anything including chilly being overpowering or too spicy .... It's an art on plate, something many eateries here should learn. To recreate this in my own kitchen , is my next project now... The sharbat was ok but nothing to write home about. Coming to the dessert, it was as I said before complimentary as well as came at a time when both of us were full. Yet , it tasted Divine. The dessert was 1 malpua, 1 portion of Bhapa sandesh and 1 rasogalla per plate. Each one was superb but the Bhapa sandesh took away the cake...It's an absolutely MUST TRY dish . What impressed me most about Oh Calcutta is this, the food and the flavor profile they successfully created. Bengali cuisine, unlike most regional cuisines, is known for it's subtlety , where different tastes will create riot on taste buds , but not one taste being overpowering ever . A flavor profile so complex that only a seasoned foodie would be able to enjoy all the notes that would elude most tongues. Oh Calcutta followed that to the T. Be it just the touch of mustard or the hint of chilly in Daab Chingri , or the kiss of tender coconut with the prawns or the subtle undertone of coconut in kanchalonka murgi or the fennel teasing your buds in the malpua , it's a game of hide and seek , a mystery that would leave you puzzled and wanting about the recipe. Therein lies...

Disappointed and deeply upset with My Stay at Hotel Ashraya International, Bangalore - Neither Family friendly nor Business friendly place

This is for the Ashraya's higher authorities and a heads up for the public:

I recently stayed at Hotel Ashraya International, Bangalore for three days this month(12th to14th of June 2024), and my experience was extremely disappointing, upsetting, frustrating, hurting and exhausting. I initially booked a single-person room for Rs.2500, but was recommended by Ashok at the reception to upgrade to a suite room because of our toddler, with an additional cost of Rs. 1500 per day. We agreed for the sake of comfort, but it turned out to be a frustrating decision.

There was no mini fridge in the supposedly called suite room, and after multiple follow-ups, a fridge was arranged but it wasn’t cooling properly. By the time a working fridge was provided the next day, the baby’s milk had spoiled. We were told baby milk from the kitchen would be complementary, but during checkout, we were charged 200 bucks per glass. We were too exhausted to argue and ended up paying.

The WiFi was not working at all. Handling a fussy toddler during growth spurts is extremely challenging, despite that after complaining multiple times, IT guy trying to fix wifi modem the whole day, wifi was finally connected on the second day, but the speed was only 9.6 Mbps with constant interruptions every 4minutes. Even loading emails was impossible, which I managed with my mobile hotspot. Even that got messed up as we were given a room change to the 2nd floor where the mobile network was poor, and the WiFi did not connect at all. We were told guests only get 1GB of data with speeds under 10 Mbps, which was not mentioned anywhere and made it impossible to do any office work, causing me to miss important office meetings and overall work.

The first day in our room was spent with a technician trying to fix the AC switch which wasn't getting off and the master control panel, which controlled all lights, fans, and the AC was malfunctioning. By the third day, we had given up, overwhelmed by the constant follow-ups and issues, especially with baby it was close to breaking down to tears to each time call them, go in person to reception n get things done, which anyway eventually did not happen. We were supposed to stay for a week but We had just given up because there was no more energy to follow up, rather no use to any of it actually!!!! Hence we checked out early.

The hospitality at this hotel is non-existent which i believe is the key to the hotel industry. The restaurant experience was equally unpleasant, with rude and rigid-faced managers who asked for our room number multiple times and made us feel unwelcome whenever we entered for our breakfast.

Lastly, there was no toilet paper provided initially. After following up with housekeeping, we were given two damp rolls that were unusable.

Overall, our three-day stay at Ashraya International was painful and upsetting and deeply frustrating. I will never stay here again and wish to escalate these issues to the owner of the hotel. I tried online to get contact with relevant authorities, but in vain. It took more than 10 days for me to recover from that and write this email. I hope some action would be taken and all restaurant staff and reception staff would be given an induction training again with bare minimum expectation from the hotel industry to show some hospitality n manners to customers, even if luxury and comfort is not provided.

PFA, some pics and video showing the interrupted poor wifi connections.

Thanks for your patience readers, I hope some action will be taken. I could share more specific details if the matter...