It is cold in the Indian restaurant Foodgasm in Eindhoven, despite the cozy, warm Christmas atmosphere. Very cold. It takes us back to the winter of 2022, when we were all at home shivering from the cold for fear of an unaffordably high energy bill. The hostess apologizes, explains that it has to do with the construction of the doors and assures us that a heat curtain will be installed to solve the problem. We must definitely come back, she emphasizes.
So foodgasm. I write it down casually, but we need to talk about that name. If you call your restaurant a culinary orgasm, you are setting the bar very high. Then you create such high expectations that you can only disappoint.
I understand, the link between food and sexual satisfaction is easily made. But the comparison has now become so worn-out, with the hysterical term 'food porn' at the forefront, that it has become a bit worn and meaningless. Especially when you see what passes for food porn these days.
Of course, there are top chefs who are able to delight you with their dishes to such an extent that you will remember them for a long time. But they belong to the absolute top and are scarce – and do not use such hyperbole for their work. I'm just saying, it's quite a promise that the food is so delicious that, well – you know what I mean by now.
The restaurant is owned by three Indian friends and serves modern Indian cuisine. That includes tasty cocktails – a good whiskey sour for my table companion and a tasty fresh-sweet Shirley Temple mocktail with grenadine for me – and unfortunately also a tablet on which you have to place your order. I would much rather have a normal menu than fiddling with those tablets that you keep tapping helplessly every now and then. But maybe I sound old-fashioned.
The presentation is modern. For example, the pani puri (fried dough crisps) come in a white cloud of nitrogen. That remains fun to see. The pani puri are extremely crispy with a sweet-sour, spicy and slightly spicy filling including yogurt. The chicken tikka grilled in the tandoori oven is well marinated and seasoned and has quite a bit of spice.
We also take the 'signature' shrimp curry from the menu, which consists of an unimpressive sauce with garlic, onion, tomato and spices and contains only four shrimps. Tasty, but not special. The butter chicken was a success, the classic that I always order to review an Indian restaurant. The sauce is lumpy and creamy, has a very subdued sweetness and a full, round taste. The large pieces of chicken thighs in it are wonderfully softly cooked.
With the exception of the shrimp curry, all portions at Foodgasm are very generous. We order four courses, but three courses are enough. And we each receive a basket of delicious, glistening, fresh naan bread with garlic. Not a lousy piece, but three tasty pieces that will last you the entire meal.
Enough vegetarian choice
The chicken biryani comes with a dough lid that you tear open to reveal the steaming hot, deeply spicy rice with buttery chicken and a hint of spiciness and dried mint. The rice grains are perfectly cooked, long and loose, they form a tasty bed for the chicken.
As you would expect in an Indian restaurant, there is also plenty to choose from for guests who do not want to eat meat. There is also a choice for them when it comes to desserts. One of the desserts we order is a vegan chocolate dessert: a brownie with a fudge-like structure, but you can taste the lack of milk, butter and eggs – there is an aftertaste that we cannot place.
Considerably better is the beautifully presented 'kheer seduction' (they know what to call dishes at Foodgasm): softly cooked basmati rice that has been cooked in milk into pudding and spiced with cardamom and saffron (the kheer). Cardamom always adds welcome warmth and depth to dishes, but in this dessert it is quite subtle. The kheer comes with a panna cotta with rose water. Rose water has quite a strong taste and can quickly become overpowering, but here I don't even remove it from the panna cotta.
Yet it is a successful dessert, with different structures. The creaminess of the panna cotta is complemented by the crispiness of puffed rice in the now so popular pink chocolate, cookie crumble and caramelized cashews.
In the Netherlands I am always looking for the Indian rapture that I experience every time in London, but the Indian restaurants I have tried so far are quite tasty, but never overwhelming. This also applies to Foodgasm. There is little to complain about. The curries are excellent, the flavors balanced, the naan bread nice and fluffy. But with little to say you won't get a foodgasm. It's nice, not wow.
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