The Real Deal

First things first: put your left hand away. You won't be needing it for a while, at least 45 minutes, and it's just so uncivilized. Second, it's Rs 80 and they keep bringing food until you beg for mercy. Third, there are no white people. This, my friends, is the food I came to find.

To be honest, everything we ate in Udaipur was special. Dinner on the first night was from a rooftop overlooking Pichola lake, and it was delicious: lamb in a cashew-and-fruit dry curry, a Mughal classic. I can't remember what Karen had I was so into it. The next night was even better: roasted, shredded chicken, again in Mughal format, with green pea pulao and a buttery, garlicky naan. Karen had the paneer sagwala, a bright green spinach and cheese stew she said was what she wished Indian food was like back home. And, due to the late arrival of another party, we got the best seat in the house, all the way out on the patio, with the lake on two sides of our table.

But it was the food at Natraj Hotel that left an impression (warning: you have no hope of finding this place without a local taking you there). The Thalia dishes are dropped unceremoniously in front of you, followed by a dollop of professional grade mint chutney and a scattering of limes and raw onion (everything is served by a troop of waiters with pots of food, a kind of mobile buffet). Next came the aloo (sort of a potato-pea mash) and an unidentifiable vegetable that Karen thought had the look and texture of a kale-broccoli hybrid, and that I thought tasted like pickled marijuana. And then the rest: a soup-like dal, chickpeas, a potato-tomato stew, raita, chappathi bread, rice. Each was remarkably different than the next: the stew was sweet and tangy, the chickpeas brain-scorchingly spicy, the aloo a veritable spice market of peppercorns, cumin, turmeric, mace and coriander. All of this is eaten via the chappathi, which is torn into pieces using only the right hand and subsequently used as the delivery mechanism. It gets messy, but the remaining bread is also your napkin.

It was explosive, a riot of flavors that's unavailable at the tourist locales.

Just when I thought it couldn't get any better, it appeared. Dropped quickly into the middle of what was rapidly becoming a mid-day mess, a single pakora. Too hot to handle, too inviting to ignore, it took a dip in the chutney before it put a big, cheese-eating grin on my face. The mint hit first, followed by the batter, a kind of tamarind-sweet, crispy and ethereally thin deep fried marvel. Inside were more potatoes and peas, but different than the aloo--this was all caraway, anise and poppy seeds. Strangely sweet, strangely evil, these guys would make bank if you could get these to go by the dozen.

Everything got a bit blurry after that. I remember forking over $3.20 for both of us and leaving a small tip. I'm frankly surprised I wasn't hit by oncoming traffic as I waddled across the street back to the rickshaw. But I guess some people have all the luck.