I’ve hardly been trying out new places these days and so I had nothing to write about. This afternoon I met up with a friend who was visiting Hyderabad. We decided to meet at a place close to his office...and he picked Great Expectations! This restaurant is located on the top floor of Shopper’s Stop. For a long time I used to think why any well meaning person would name a restaurant ?Great Expectations?. I realized today.
This place was advertised a lot around the time it was launched. It was supposed to be a multi-cuisine diner. ( I should?ve known that in Hyderabad, multi-cuisine means Indian, Tandoori and Chinese food.) The restaurant has a nice ambience and décor. And before I forget, a beautiful menu.
The music that they play seems to be the same set of songs that I hear in every other restaurant, shopping mall and theatre in Hyderabad. It?s a collection of MLTR, Backstreet Boys, Boyzone, Celine Dion and Toni Braxton. I get the feeling these guys get a free cassette or CD with their licences to open these places.
The menu is extensive. It features Lebanese, Italian, Chinese, Indian, Continental and Hyderabadi food. To be on the safe side, we should?ve ordered Butter Naan and Paneer Butter Masala. But we had to be daring?and act like we truly don?t belong. To strike a balance, we started with Cream of Tomato soup and Spicy Fried Babycorn.
They can?t go wrong with the soup, can they? How dare I think such thoughts? They brought us the soup reasonably fast, but it was lukewarm. Other than that, it was nothing great. Spicy Fried Babycorn wasn?t all that spicy because I had requested them to tone it down. But it tasted like badly made bajji / pakoda.
We were still under the spell of the beautiful menu that we didn?t think about what we were ordering. They have pages dedicated to Mediterranean cuisine. But my friend didn?t feel like eating hummus and falafel, so we decided to go Italian. We ordered Spaghetti Neapolitan and some form of Cannelloni. The guy had no clue what we were asking for and quickly brought his superior.
That gentleman was most kind to us. He looked me in the eye and said, ?Sorry Ma?m, we don?t have any Lebanese items available?. I started to tell him that Spaghetti Neapolitan was Italian and not Lebanese, and he stood there saying, ?No Ma?m, you don?t know. It is of course Lebanese food.? Finally my friend asked him what was available and he said, ?Everything except the Lebanese food.? We decided to stick to Indian food, but I really didn?t feel up to Naan and Paneer Butter Masala.
So we ordered stuffed capsicum and dal makhni (what we endure for good friends), a tandoori roti and a masala kulcha. My masala kulcha was the weirdest kulcha I?ve ever seen/ eaten. It was like a badly made puran poli. The stuffing was all in one corner and I had to scrape it out and eat the roti alone. The stuffed capsicum was very nice but the dal makhni was sad. I usually don?t care much for it, and today it was pathetic.
Even the desserts menu was extensive, but we didn?t want to be fooled. So we called the waiter and asked him what was available. He told us what wasn?t. Fine by us. My friend ordered a fresh lime soda and I (intrepid as always) ordered Zuccotto. It turned out to be quite nice. Relatively speaking, that is. The cake was a little dry, but the rest of it wasn?t even half as disastrous as I?d expected it to be.
On the whole, I wouldn?t recommend this place to anyone. Its bang in the center of the city?and the prices are not sky high, but the food is average and the restaurant, empty. If you?re in the vicinity and feel the urge to grab a bit, try Rendezvous across the street or even the food court at Shopper?s Stop?just outside this restaurant. Anywhere but here.