Where to find the best Kerala curry in Dubai

Here's a lowdown on the meanest mallu food in town

If a certain fast-food chain hadn't already gotten its claws around it, then 'finger-licking good' would have been a description befitting Kerala food. For nothing bothers a true-blue Malayali more than having to dig into food from 'God's Own Country' with a fork and a knife. And if you are ready to get your hands deep into a spicy chicken varutharachathu (chicken cooked in roasted ground coconut) mopped up with some fluffy appams or an aromatic biryani, which seems bland till the first morsel reaches your mouth, then Dubai is the place to be. Any complaints about food back home being better can be left at the doorstep when you enter Calicut Paragon at Al Karama. From the Malabari biryani, which HAS to be washed down with their disco chai to the ubiquitous fish curry meals - a staple in most Malayali homes - the restaurant draws in crowds craving the ultimate comfort food.

Alternatively, try our new discovery, Bangalore Imperial, that serves a mean (get the pun?) fish mango curry and mutton biryani. On weekends, they serve a traditional sadya for Dh20, with all the fanfare usually reserved for Onam and Vishu. Another favourite is Masala Bay at Discovery Gardens. A bit pricey perhaps, but their bamboo biryani (cooked in a bamboo trunk, and if you dine in you can watch the aromatic rice and meat being pushed out of one end of the bamboo stem onto your plate) is well worth a try, and so is their meen pollichathu (fish cooked and served in a plantain leaf) and beef kizhi - a bestseller, we're told. They have a branch in Karama too. In Al Quoz, Wide Range is the other gem, which serves the most amazing fish masala fry and it's the simplest yet most delicious fish curry lunch we've ever tasted.

The best joints

> Malabar Palace, Al Karama

> Wide Range, Al Quoz

> Penthouse, Al Nahda

ambica@khaleejtimes.com