Spice up your life
Classic Indian gastronomy in a bohemian setting is on the menu at Musafir, writes Michael Bird
September 2009 - From the Print Edition
Inside a recycled shipping container in an industrial alley-way at the back of a reconverted 19th century goods exchange is a new open-air venue with white benches and a beach bar serving up top quality, home-cooked Indian cuisine.
The concept of the ambitious bar-restaurant Musafir is unique organic meals which use local produce as the basis, overlaid with inventive cocktails of spices from Bengal and the Punjab. Lamb, chicken and vegetarian dishes are on the menu and Musafir will soon import a Tandoor clay oven to ensure dishes have a more consistent and authentic flavour and texture.
Resident spicemaster and venue manager Amarjit Sidhu can adjust the heat or flavour of each dish according to taste, and will converse with guests to gauge their idea of a perfect curry. A former pilot, photographer and restaurateur Sidhu is known to many as the man behind the kitchen in north Bucharest hotspot Barka Saffron. He also oversaw the short-lived, but sadly missed Museo Cafe inside the Geology Museum on Piata Victoriei.
Sidhu has now headed south to join up with a motley crew of Romanian bohemian businesspeople who have established a platform for culture, design and advertising professionals to work and socialise next to a wholesale flower market, known as The Ark.
The name Musafir itself means traveller or guest and is a Persian word which has also entered into parlance of Turkey, India and Romania. The venue will be showing movies on Thursdays and also encourages poetry and play readings, as well as photography exhibitions.
As if to highlight its boho credentials, the restaurant is yet to have a sign indicating where the place is - but in case you get lost on the way, it does have its own site on Facebook.
Musafir
Dinner with drinks for two: costs about 35 Euro
Behind ‘The Ark’, 196A Calea Rahovei
Tel: 074 069 0690
Facebook: Musafir by Amarjit