Indian food in The Pattaya Trader : Crown of India.
The Good, The Naughty and the Downright Delicious!
As it’s always tempting to “fill your boots” when you’re presented with such a great selection on the menu at Crown of India we decided that we would, on this occasion at least try to be good. Therefore we started with some light bites and very tasty they were too. A selection of Vegetable and Paneer (cheese) Pakora which we accompanied with a serving of Raita. This proved to be a great combo as the light taste of the raita, a yogurt containing crunchy crisp onions (there are various options available) really worked with the chickpea batter and I have to say the Raita was tremendous value at only 80 baht. The serving was plentiful enough for two to share and even lasted into our main course, proving to be a soothing accompaniment to the curries that we had requested as hot and spicy!
Before the main course we also tried the Daal Shorba. To my mind no trip to an Indian restaurant is complete without a serving of 
Daal – and we all know that lentils are good for us ! Usually I order this in the form of a side dish along with the curry but again as we were going for a lighter option the Shorba (Curry flavored lentil soup) was a delicate broth consistency. Warmed with the heat of the soup as well as its spicy flavor I was reminded of my father’s favorite saying when eating Indian food “That really clears away the cobwebs” and it was true, you could almost feel the soup doing you good – especially with all the colds and flu around at the moment.
Then as we thought we’d been good enough it was time to get naughty- but not too naughty ! Please note we didn’t fill up on the many options of rice and nan available but instead went for the lighter Roti to work with our Mutton Rogan Josh. This was in a ruby red, rich, creamy sauce and the mutton I’m pleased to report had been well cooked and was extremely tender. Then we shared a Chicken Tikka Butter Masala perhaps not the lowest calorific option on the menu being thick and satisfying but it was just how you want a hearty, robust curry to be.
With the defences truly down and feeling pleasantly full we still had a little room for the “Downright delicious” . Gulab Jamun a dessert that hails from the north of India but is popular throughout the country comprising of 2 deep-fried dumplings (or you could say donuts) made from dried milk [khoya] are covered in a rose-cardamom flavored sugar syrup Quite a treat !