Pesarattu & Allam Pachadi
22 AED
Whole green-gram crepe, crisped on a cast-iron tawa, with a ginger-cumin chutney and a drizzle of sesame oil.
Eight chapters, one table. Andhra is among the most varied of India's cuisines — coastal, inland, vegetarian, hunter — and the menu reads, intentionally, like a small book.
Begin lightly, eat with your hands, and ask us about the seasonal additions. All prices in AED, inclusive of VAT.
Small plates from the morning kitchen — crepes, fritters, and the gentle warmth before the fire arrives.
Whole green-gram crepe, crisped on a cast-iron tawa, with a ginger-cumin chutney and a drizzle of sesame oil.
Fermented rice-and-urad dumplings, deep-fried until lace-edged, served with gunpowder podi and a spoon of slow-set ghee.
Long green chilies stuffed with tamarind-onion masala, batter-fried and slit open at the table.
Toasted lentil and chili powder, served with steamed idlis and a small jug of ghee — pour generously.
Hand-shaped urad doughnuts, fried to order, drowned in a brothy drumstick sambar.
Our breakfast classic — the green-gram crepe stuffed with a tempered semolina upma. House gunpowder on the side.
Day-boat fish and prawns, cooked the way the Andhra coast cooks them — sharp, smoke-tinged, and always with tamarind.
Today's catch in a tamarind-and-gongura gravy, finished with curry leaf and fenugreek. Ask for the fish of the day.
Prawns tossed dry with curry leaves, mustard seeds and a coastal red-chili masala — almost a snack, eaten with rice and ghee.
Hilsa from the Godavari delta, slow-cooked in clay with tamarind, allspice and palm jaggery. Available June through August only.
Sun-dried prawn fry with caramelised onions and curry leaf — pungent, salt-edged, ancestral.
Pomfret fillets, marinated in chili-garlic-coriander masala, shallow-fried until edges crisp.
Prawns folded into a slow-cooked chickpea-flour pithala, finished with chopped coriander and lemon.
Free-range meats over a charcoal sigri — Telangana hunter-style, finished with mustard ghee and curry leaf.
Andhra coastal chicken fry — tempered with curry leaf, mustard and Guntur chili. Eat with rice; do not waste the masala.
Country chicken in a Telangana gravy of roasted poppy, copra and red chilies — the long-cook curry, served on the bone.
Slow-braised goat in sorrel leaves, fenugreek and dried red chili — the Telangana classic. The kitchen's signature.
Charcoal-roasted chicken folded into spiced rice, with brown onion, mint and fried cashews.
Mutton in a thick coriander-and-coconut masala — semi-dry, almost a chutney; eat with bagara annam.
Prawns chargrilled over a sigri, basted with a chili-garlic masala. Served with a wedge of lemon and onion rings.
The vegetarian table — lentils, leafy greens, tubers and tamarind. Eat with hot rice and a spoon of ghee.
Toor dal cooked with sorrel leaves until silken, tempered with garlic, mustard and crushed dried chili.
Smoked aubergines, pounded with green coriander, raw garlic and roasted peanut; tempered with curry leaf.
Okra in a tamarind-and-jaggery broth, finished with fried curry leaves. Sweet-sour-spicy in the proper Telugu order.
A bowl of horsegram broth, slow-reduced to a glossy mahogany — Krishna delta restorative, taken hot with ragi balls.
Potato curry with mustard temper and a finish of fresh coriander — the Sunday breakfast standard, perfected.
Ridge gourd cooked down with vine-ripened tomato, jaggery and a Guntur-chili finish.
Layered rice, slow-fired under a flour seal — and the older grains: millets and broken rice, the way the inland kitchens still cook.
Aged basmati layered with marinated mutton, kewra, mint, brown onion — sealed under dough, slow-fired on charcoal. The standard.
The same method, made with marinated chicken on the bone. Served with mirchi-ka-salan and burani raita.
Short-grain seeraga samba rice, slow-cooked with mutton, a small mountain of brown onion, and a tamarind-shallot raita.
Fragrant rice tempered with whole spices and ghee — the quiet partner to almost any curry on this menu.
Hand-rolled finger-millet balls, served warm with a country-chicken curry. The Rayalaseema farmer's lunch.
Cold-tempered rice in a raw-mango broth with green chili and onion. A summer-table tradition.
Three set tables, each served on a fresh banana leaf, in the order our grandmothers laid them out. Available daily, 12:00 — 15:30.
Nineteen vessels: rice, pappu, sambar, three curries, pulihora, vepudu, gongura pachadi, avakaya, karam podi with ghee, bobbatlu, payasam, vada, buttermilk. The whole feast.
The festival table — adds ariselu, sakinalu, pulagam, pappannam, and a small clay pot of fresh chakkera-pongali.
Six curries, podi, rice, sambar, pulihora, vada, payasam. A complete vegetarian table — no shortcuts.
All of the above, with the addition of kodi vepudu, fish pulusu and mutton iguru.
Pickles and podis from our pantry — also available to take home from sankranti.store.
Raw mango, mustard, fenugreek and red chili — sealed in oil, aged through the Abu Dhabi summer.
Sorrel leaves pounded with garlic, sesame, red chili — bright, tart, and a little fierce.
Boneless fish pickle, country-style — slow-aged in mustard oil and garlic.
A chili-garlic podi made for hot rice and a generous spoon of ghee. Hotter than it looks.
Toasted toor lentils, dried chili and sesame — the breakfast podi, made for idli and dosa.
Coconut, gunpowder and curry leaf — the elegant podi, for when the chili-garlic feels too direct.
The way our grandmothers ended every meal — and every festival.
A flatbread stuffed with coconut and palm jaggery, brushed with warm ghee and served folded.
The paper sweet — rice-starch films layered with powdered jaggery and ghee. Atreyapuram, brought to Abu Dhabi.
Rice-and-jaggery rounds, deep-fried in ghee until lace-edged, finished with toasted sesame.
Roasted gram-flour laddoo, set slowly with palm jaggery and ghee. Keeps well, travels better.
Steamed colostrum custard with palm jaggery and cardamom — a country dessert, rare to find.
Slow-cooked rice pudding with cashews, saffron and ghee — the temple-offering version.