Ustad Hotel is unfortunately not as indulgent as the movie, Ustad Hotel (one of my favourite films) and leaves you a tad disappointed! FOOD – not only does it nourish your body, but it also nourishes your soul, and for the food to nourish your soul, the service has to be at least borderline satisfactory.

On a balmy Friday afternoon, my husband and I decided to have our afternoon lunch at Ustad hotel. The ambience is pretty good, replete with paintings on the wall, creating this rustic ambience. We decided to have a traditional Kerala Sadya – being a vegetarian, I opted for the veg meal and my husband had the fish curry meal. The veg meal had an avial, chammanthi (chutney), pappadam, thoran,  pineapple pachadi, pickle, sambar and rice and the non-veg meal consisted of the same items along with some fish curry and of course, the sambharam (buttermilk). Now, the food, to be very honest, was good. However, the service didn’t quite match up to the food. One of the servers, it seemed, was not too keen to serve a second helping. In fact, he seemed a bit rude. No, he didn’t say much but the body language was a total giveaway. Not sure if I am eloquent enough, but you just know it right, when somebody isn’t too keen to serve you – little things like smiling, asking if the guest is enjoying her meal, insisting on a second helping goes a long way and forces one to keep coming back to the restaurant.

The meal ended with the traditional sabudana (sago) payasam but left a bittersweet taste in the mouth. I am not sure if I’d be coming back anytime soon to Ustad Hotel.

Food : The food is good, in plain language.

Ambience : 3/5 for sure! Creative with all the paintings and stuff but the place is a bit cramped.

Service : SMILE and serve, I’d say! Also, serve because you want to and not because you have to! 🙂