Amith invited us over for lunch over at his parent’s apartment and we were excited to go. We of course started with some gin and tonics made with some Japanese Roku gin with some fresh squeezed lime juice. Amith’s dad wanted to put some sprite into our drinks, but Amith dissuaded him from doing that.

We had some nibbles to start before lunch – some cucumber and carrot (a striking red on the outside and orange on the inside) and onion each topped with some coriander/cilantro.

The lunch itself was fantastic. We had some dishes local to Kerala, in the southernwestern coast of India. We had some grilled chicken, cauliflower, chicken curry. Some of the best bits of the grilled chicken were the gristly seasoned fatty bits at the bottom. The curry was delicious with the rice to soak up the sauce. There was also some mango puree made from Alphonso mangoes, the “king of mangoes.” I’ve certainly had a lot of mangoes in my time (esp. since my parents also grow a large variety of them in their yard) and these were incredibly rich tasting, not overly sweet either. Just look at the color of them.

And despite how good lunch was, the desserts we had were off the chart. The little round balls, esp. the white ones, the kozhukatta (coconut jaggery (raw cane sugar)) were my favorite. The other ones in the tins with a creamy caramel type sauce were insanely good as well. No complaints at all about the other desserts either. The Ras Malai(?) with the fresh paneer-like (but not as firm) balls in the creamy saffron sauce…delicious. Needless to say we more than satisfied as we ate more than our fill from our visit here.