Reaching 20000 KM In My FZ 16

Its not even been 2 years since I bought the amazing Yamaha FZ 16. It surprises me now though that how much I have used the bike since then. It has already finished 20000 KM and that too in Bangalore Traffic ... Ugh. It still feels new when you drive it, well probably no the tires. They don't give the same confidence in turns and gravel as they used to earlier. But otherwise it's pretty much holding on to its initial glory. Sadly I haven't been on any long bike trips since it completed 10k KM , so the longest trip till date still is to mysore.

I haven't had any problems with the bike as such, but there might have been a small puncture which I couldn't even notice because of the tubeless tires . A friend realized when he borrowed it and got it fixed.

Luckily there haven't been any accidents too. There were a couple of narrow misses though.

The bike stunt

One gloomy evening I was returning from office and it was raining like hell. I could hardly see the road and the great Bangalore traffic wasn't helping. I tried to overtake a bus that had decided it was prudent to board passengers by stopping right in the middle of the road. And just like everyone else a car was overtaking the bus too , this resulted in me to go way to the right than I was supposed to be. Now it was pretty dark and the rains made it even harder to see. I did not realize my mistake till I saw the big block of stone lying on the road . It was basically a piece of the divider that had come off. It was about 1.5 Foot for sure. I was too close to it to even brake. I just drove over it and I wish someone had recorded it. It was literally a feeling from the movies , the bike jumped landed perfectly and I just continued thanking my luck.

Damn Pedestrians

Everyone learnt in school how to cross the road . Its simple.

Look to the left, look to the right, Look to the left again and if there are no vehicles cross the road.

Here's what Bangalorean's have been taught. 

Look to the left, start walking while you look at the traffic on the right. 

Its absolutely absurd when you find pedestrian's crossing the road and looking away from the oncoming traffic. Talk about keeping an eye on the destination. 

I was doing pretty good speed on an absolutely straight road, and I got distracted by some guy honking for no reason. When I looked ahead my heart skipped a beat, no make that double, there was a girl crossing the road looking towards her left and I was going directly towards her from the right. I braked as much as possible without skidding and missed her closer than I would have wished for. Luckily there was no contact because at that speed it would be pretty dangerous.

Other than these there have been the usual crazy Autowala's and bus drivers who have no clue what traffic rules are. So I guess we can say it's been a good year.

Eggy Wrap in Cafe Coffee Day - Stir The Coffee And Taste The Egg

Eggy Wrap, Cafe Coffee Day Reviewed by Sougata Khan on Nov 6. Eggy Wraps, are delicious. Eggy Wraps are a pretty good addition to Cafe Coffee Days Menu. Rating: 3

Cafe Coffee Day is one of the few Indian brands that are simply a class apart. The default place to hangout, the usual meeting place and the perfect drink - coffee. Recently CCD has started adding a more wider range of items to their food menu. This is pretty good for both the business and customers. Variety is the after all the spice of life. There has been only one thing missing from their menu which is now complete - The humble Egg.

Eggy Wrap Cafe Coffee Day

Cafe Coffee Day recently launched Eggy Wrap - Delicious Spicy Scrambled Eggs in a Wrap.

Since None of the food in CCD is freshly prepared it's quite difficult to serve Indian/Indianish food. As you might have noticed the Bread/Wrap is very much like Indian Roti/Paratha. Unless freshly prepared they tend to be rubbery and hard. Luckily the Eggy Wrap doesn't fare too bad there. The Wrap gets pretty moist when microwaved and tastes fine but the edges of the wrap still remain a bit chewy. I would disregard this one bit for the Eggy Wrap and still recommend it to everyone simply because its pretty good overall. 

The Eggy wrap can get a bit messy to eat if you remove the packaging completely as I did for the photo. But then it will get messy anyway when you add the awesome CCD ketchup. So I would suggest go grab an Eggy Wrap for yourself and get Eggy messy. 

Calzone Pockets From Domino's Pizza - A Long Way To Go

Domino's has probably one of the best Pizza's, well at least in India. Without any doubt they are the best when it comes to home delivery of Pizza. Just like other international food chains Domino's too tries to bring in new flavors and new dishes to the Indian Market that are well suited to our unique taste buds. Albeit it's not an easy task. After all we are a nation of many nations. Its quite amazing how we have managed to settle on our love for pizza, something so unlike our traditional food. Of course pizza would have probably been dead in India had it not been for the quirks and fixes for our taste.  

Calzone Pockets

The latest Item on Domino's Menu is the Calzone Pockets. I was pretty excited with the concept. Its always a messy affair having Juicy or overloaded pizza. I hate wasting good toppings, and you can only do so much when it starts spilling over the gooey goodness. The Calzone Pockets seemed to fix that, its like a spill proof pizza. The only place the filing may drip is probably your lips. Ummmm

However I was actually quite disappointed with what I got. The Calzone Pockets though a good concept is poorly executed. The bread is soft and different, which probably is the only good part of it. The USP that Calzone Pocket seemed to promise (The no spill Yum Goodness of filling) , simply because there is hardly any filling. The filling was rather way deep inside the pockets, and whatever was there had too little chicken. I was expecting it to be bursting with filling, well simply because it can. 

I am hoping Domino's get's the cue from this and replaces the filling with something that can probably get Katrina to shift from Slice to Calzone Pockets. Imagine filling dripping down her lips. You get the picture. 

Prices

Veg Calzone Costs ₹85 and Non Veg Calzone Pocket costs ₹95. The Prices are pretty fair because they are actually pretty huge. But its just an illusion, kind of like how lays packets look big. The filling needs to be more.

Calzone Pockets, Domino's Pizza Reviewed by Sougata Khan on Nov 4. 

Calzone Pockets From Domino's Pizza - A Long Way To Go 

Calzone Pockets are a rather Disappointing Item from Domino's pizza 

Rating: 1

Simple Diwali Celebrations at Suncity

Diwali

Diwali or Deepavali is primarily a Hindu Festival, but it is celebrated by pretty much everyone in India. Other than the ritualistic temple visits and pujas, people usually gift sweets or dry fruits and burst crackers. Other than India Diwali is celebrated in Singapore, Mauritius, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Suriname, Trinidad & Tobago, Malaysia, Myanmar, Fiji and Guyana. 

Firecrackers

A couple of weeks before Diwali a number of cracker shops pop up all over the city. I love the rocket fireworks that go up in the sky and burst into an array of colors, but then they are pretty costly and unless you have a huge open space or terrace to burst them its not usually feasible. This time it was a pretty low key affair for me though. We just got some small fireworks - a couple of loud bombs, sparklers, chakris and flower pots. There were a few rockets too but they were pretty simple.

Suncity

Living in large apartment complexes is sometimes a great boon, especially with a view of the lake. Neighbors and the Apartment Association usually light up the buildings in an array of colors and you can spot awesome fireworks for days from the balcony. For safety reasons bursting crackers is only allowed in the adjoining playground. Though its safer than doing the same near the buildings it gets a bit risky even otherwise. We closely dodged 3 rockets that misfired and it could have been pretty bad if even one had hit us. Then there are crazy people who have no regard for other's safety leave alone their own. Some people were lighting crackers in their palms and throwing them at the last moment. While it was obviously dangerous for them to do that, since they did not regard their limbs to be disposable we didn't really care. But they were throwing the bombs pretty close to us and that got pretty irritating. Thankfully it didn't last for too long.

Bursting Crackers

So we found the safest place in the playground and started with our small bunch of firecrackers. It was awfully difficult to get pictures of the rockets but I managed to capture the rest. In spite of our low key collection of firecrackers we took almost 2 hours to burst them all. Only one of our rockets misfired and  narrowly missed a van parked nearby. We too had our scary moments when others rockets misfired and narrowly missed us. We actually had to duck and get out of its way.

This is the time when driving on the streets and even walking is pretty risky because of firecrackers misfiring. Not to mention the heavy pollution this causes. Well if you are celebrating or not I wish you have a safe and happy Diwali.

 

Kentucky Fried Chicken Rice Bowlz - A Great Value for Money

KFC has been releasing dishes that are tailor made for the Indian masses. Its actually a pretty tough job to keep a billion people happy, especially when they speak 1000 different languages, and the culture and taste changes every 10 miles. The tastes vary from the sweet toothed Gujaratis to the hottest chilly in the world.

The Rice Bowlz

The Rice Bowlz has come as an answer to this diversity. Except for a few states rice is the staple food in India. So this is probably the best bet KFC can make in getting something on their menu that will be popular everywhere. As the name suggests its basically a bowl of rice with pieces of chicken popcorn and gravy. The gravy is way down at the bottom. I actually did not realize there was any gravy at all till I had almost reached the end of the bowl. Needless to say it goes well with the awesome KFC Ketchup and soft drink.

There is also a vegetarian version of the rice bowl. The rice was pretty good and the curry/gravy was actually really nice. So the vegetarian bowl makes a good deal too. But then I would always prefer to have the chicken. But if you for some reason do not want to have chicken, the veg Rice Bowlz will rescue you.

There are other variants of the Rice Bowlz in Philippines but again those are tailored to the local tastes. But they look way more delicious than what we got here.

Price 

The rice bowlz is probably the best priced item that KFC has in terms of value for money. The veg rice bowlz costs 69 and the non veg one costs 79. Just the Rice Bowl is enough to satisfy those hunger pangs or a light dinner/lunch. But if you want to indulge then you can also go for a meal , though that will cost you way more. But then you get extra gravy which I think will be well worth it.

Rice Bowlz, Kentucky Fried Chicken Reviewed by Sougata Khan on Nov 3.
Rice Bowlz From Kentucky Fried Chicken - A Great Value for Money
Rice Bowlz is a great value for money from KFC
Rating: 3

The Egg Factory St Marks Road Its Egilicious

Bangalore once may have been city of gardens , city of lakes or pensioners paradise. But now it is none of those . Bangalore is now a city of restaurants and pubs. Not many new pubs though thanks to the Government. A Gem among all the usual, overpriced and rather average restaurants is Egg Factory. It is literally like nothing else. Its the only egg themed restaurant. Every dish is made from eggs except a couple for Pure vegans. 

The place gets really crowded so better be ready to wait or come early or a bit late than the usual times. 

Location

The only Egg Factory I have been to is the first one that was started in St Marks Road. Looks like they have opened new ones in Jayanagar and Ulsoor. I need to visit them soon.

Ambiance

The ambiance is very chilled out and a bit funky. You got crazy egg related things everywhere. Not sure why they have a metal cock hanging on the walls though. Unless they expect it to lay eggs , damn unrealistic expectations of the boss. The menu is multilingual and comes in the form of a manual. Its pretty unique in everything . The tables and chairs are very normal but they go well with the informal ambiance. The specials board is something to look out for. They also have won numerous awards and they are all displayed proudly.

Food

The Food is as they term it - Egilicious. One of my favourite is the Ménage à trois. Somehow I end up ordering only this every single time I go to Egg Factory. There is also the quite popular choco sin dessert. The Pasta Al Bhurj was pretty good.

The Egg Factory Reviewed by Sougata Khan on Nov 2.
The Egg Factory - Egilicious
The Egg Factory is without any doubt one of the best Restaurants in Bangalore

Rating: 4

Ground Floor, Whitehouse, St.Marks Road, 
Bangalore, 
Karnataka 
India 
560001 

Halloween in Toit Brew Pub in Bangalore - Best Costume Male

Halloween in India

Halloween is something very American and needless to say isn't very popular in India. However it is catching up ,thanks to the young crowd in India. Effectively Halloween is celebrated in mostly pubs and Homes, and that too isn't everywhere. Probably it would have helped if Diwali wasn't so close to Halloween.

Halloween in Bangalore

Most pubs in Bangalore Celebrate Halloween , and have quite an elaborate ambiance and decor. But the crowd that comes really dressed isn't a lot . The main reason being its very hard to find the right costume. There are pretty much no shops that have quality stuff. The few results that we get when we search for "Halloween Costumes Bangalore" are actually cheap fancy dress shops that are not worth anything. So the Best Bet is to buy them at the pub itself. 

Drinks

Toit is a Brewery and Serves its own specialty Beer. I am not quite a big fan of beer so it was a Black Dog 12 Years and the all famous Long Island Iced Tea for me.

Ambience

Toit usually gets the Halloween ambiance pretty good. There were all kinds of scary and spooky stuffs all over the Pub. Cob webs , witches, skulls and pickled Brains. 

The Awesome Employees of Toit

The Ambiance was brought alive by the dressed up waiters and Scary ghosts all over the Pub. There were really tall fairy and devil . But the best was a woman in white sari. She would just randomly pop up and scare the hell out of people.

My Vampire Costume

 I had chosen a vampire getup and It came together pretty well. And as luck would have it , I managed to grab the best dressed male award there. Yay. The best dressed couple were actually way more innovative and they had come as the Flintstones.  I wonder where did they manage to get those costumes unless they got it abroad or made it themselves. I wish there were some good shops selling Halloween Costumes in India.