Sri Ganapathi Mess — Restaurant in Petaling Jaya

I heard many good things about the banana leaf here. Managed to gather a couple of friends to have an early lunch here at 11:45am on a Thursday to avoid the crowd. There were only 2 tables occupied when we arrived in the air conditioned area. Then came the banana leaves. That itself was already an unnoticed warning shot fired. The banana leaves were half yellow and when I did the wipe test, it was dirty. Given the choice of standard white rice or Indian rice, we all chose the Indian rice. The rice came. It was cold. I asked them for hot rice and the boy came back again with room temperature rice. The condiments though quite tasty were also all room temperature except the raita which definitely came straight out of the fridge. The curry sauces were not bad but it was warm, not hot. We ordered 4 additional dishes which were all very small portions. The chicken varuval was average. The only freshly prepared dish was the small ikan bawal (black pomfret) which was freshly fried. When the mutton varuval came, you can clearly see that this must have been refried from yesterday. It was dry and burnt. But the fried chicken was the one that took the prize. Again, it looked refried from yesterday m. Not only that, it was completely tasteless. I can say that I have not had a worst fried chicken to date. Our bill including 2 ice tea and a water came to RM 78.80 which I thought was a bit overpriced even if the food was decent. What can I say? It was definitely a mess!I won’t recommend this banana leaf...

I went here for banana leaf rice with my friends. They serve authentic BLR on a real banana leaf for only RM10 (with no tax, in this economy!). The free sides that come with the banana leaf rice are: your choice of white rice or indian rice, poppadom, a fresh cucumber salad, bayam cooked with yellow gravy (which was delicious), french beans in a flavourful red curry, and mango chutney (it was too sour for my taste, if you don't like sour food, just ask for a little to try). As with other BLR, all the above components are refillable, you just have to ask the waiter. There was also free herbal water on the table which was a very nice palate cleanser.

Honestly, the waiter uncle was so kind. He made sure to offer us more poppadoms, rice and curry whenever he noticed we had run out. The service was genuinely very good and attentive.

I also had the hot teh tarik which was surprisingly good. It was a milky tea that was just the right amount of tea and sweetness. We ordered chicken varuval, fish cutlet, fried chicken and crab rassam too. The fish cutlet can maybe be described as a deep fried fish paste with spices, a little bit like an otak-otak but not really. Their fried chicken was delightfully crispy and melt in your mouth tender.

Would...

2.5 of those 3 stars goes to their nandu rasam. The remaining 0.5 star is for the food, drinks, service & ambience.

The nandu rasam is awesome. It’s like an Indian tequila shot u need on days when your tongue/throat Jz needs that kick. Jz the right amount of dose served in a small tumblr. One of their puttu kinda stuff (sura puttu maybe) is worth a try too.

The fried items? Flour, masala, salt, hot oil. It’s a con job. Tastes almost like the first attempt after watching a YouTube cooking video.

Overall Food is average. Go there when you’re hungry to really enjoy it. It’s kinda hyped & the way the whole mess concept is uniquely presented probably gives it that hype I guess.

Go here & take away some nandu rasam. I’ll suggest a couple of other restaurants for what dish they’re good at. Take away all of them, get a banana leaf, cook your own rice (coz these guys rob u RM2-4 for a simple 15-20 min rice cooker task) & have a better banana leaf at home knowing every dish will be perfect.

There’s Jz no perfect banana leaf restaurant - I guess.

But what wud I know. I’m Jz a vegetarian

Italians should get annoyed when every shop in every corner that whoops a pasta dish with meatballs is rated as an Italian cuisine heaven.

Indians...