Waldorf...tasting nostalgia!

[Ignore the redness that envelopes the images like a tinted cellophane. Waldorf is an awfully lit eatery.]

Dusk grows into night late on weekends. It was one such overripe Friday evening and a string of misses landed me at a gate I barely thought I ever would. #uncookedwords

Until a shade over two decades ago Waldorf was my household’s most obvious recourse whenever the craving for ‘Chinese’ would strike. Sited at the heart of Park Street, Waldorf was that oft-repeating dream that visited me mostly on Saturdays. An imposing door swung open to the sprawling hall always welcoming with a heady whiff of delicious delicacies mixed indistinguishably like twined vines of countless colours. My first few minutes would go in singling out dishes from that aromatic jumble.

We parted ways for no good reason after Waldorf changed hands in the '90s and moved to neighbouring Russell Street. I was wrong. And I was wrong like never before.

Turns out, a stroke of luck brought me back to Waldorf. And, I yielded on the grounds of a mounting appetite. Bowls showed up cradling Garden Fresh Mushroom Soup with Chicken, flaunting a flavorous richness buoying up generous chunks of mushroom and appealing egg ribbons. A few drops of chilli sauce restored the drama I compulsively seek in soup-bowls. Briskly crumb-fried prawns of heft as accompanying Crispy Butterfly Prawns chuffed with remarkable freshness. True founts of crackling juiciness. Delicious enough to make the fiercest of landlubbers yield to sea. Now I doubt no more that it is the vigour of freshness that adds most of what we praise in seafood. How naïve! Suddenly I started ruing my 22 years of pointless abstinence. Chilli Chicken is an old flame I keep stalking regardless. Deep fried chicken nuggets dipped in corn slurry and rounded up with soya sauce left me cavorting to the acute dismay of my kind co-diners. Be that on quantity, taste or nostalgia, Waldorf’s Chilli Chicken excelled on all counts. Mixed Chilli Garlic Noodles came well cooked and with a lot of everything – and some semblance of Sichuan fury. Crispy Chilli Lamb in Sichuan sauce, served in quantity, was notably over-crisped and knotty. Like the droppings of some animal I don't remember. A fall from grace that was soon undone by a yummy Darsan of unique physiognomy – deep-fried honey-noodles buried in thick layers of Chocolate ice-cream topped with a jiggling wad of jelly that rolls down with the majesty of molten lava. Enough to thank god for this fulsome life.

Guesswork never bodes well for sensual appreciation whatsoever. I learnt that too early but the hard way. Consider visiting Waldorf when you have no axe to grind. Just like I did. And enjoy.