In today's episode we are out on an Old Delhi food tour with a celebrity chef to introduce her ultimate Delhi street food. She is London based celebrity chef and restaurateur Dipna Anand. It was our first food walk at our favourite food destination after almost a year of prolonged lockdown. Both Chef Dipna and we were excited about the prospect of the gastronomic experience.
We started our journey from Chandni Chowk which had recently undergone a facelift that looks so amazing. There seems to be less chaos because of the absence of four wheelers. A quick rickshaw ride took us to Shiv Mishran Bhandar in Kucha Ghasiram. This place is known for their ghee fried jalebis and bedmi puri. After trying her hand in making some jalebis, Chef Dipna tried it along with the hot bedmi puris. The jalebis were a clear winner of the two.
Next destination was Hemchand Ladli Prashad whose milk cake is the best in the city. Made with just milk and sugar, the dense, granular, optimally sweet and slightly caramelised fudge-like sweet sent her in raptures.
From there we headed to another iconic and notably the best sweet shop in the locality i.e. Chaina Ram Sindhi Halwai. It is renowned for its formidable age, delightful assortment of sweets and snacks and extreme popularity with both locals and tourists. Here we made her try the sev badam, kaju katli, coconut burfi and their signature Karachi halwa. Chef Dipna was amazed at the sheer brilliance of these sweets.
Then we took a battery rickshaw ride and reached the Old Kheer Shop in Chawri Bazar. As the name suggests, this old shop dates back to 1880. They serve an incredibly delicious plain kheer whose seemingly easy recipe is a secret. It's creamy and rich taste simply spellbound her.
After the surfeit of sweets we headed to the legendary Aslam Chicken to try their butter chicken which is a scary yet irresistible dish containing grilled chicken sitting in a pool of spiced butter. Chef Dipna loved its gratifying taste with roomali rotis.
Finally we ended the tour with another very popular and unique dessert that is the sahi tukda from Cool Point. The refreshingly chilled mango ice cream just enhanced the taste of the hot sahi tukda to another level. The unusual combination was a revelation for Chef Dipna. It was truly a wonderful evening full of gustatory indulgences and stories.