We’ve never really thought too much about Goregaon, it’s never faced the full force of our drunken, suburban rants; it’s not remote enough like Borivali or important enough like Andheri to warrant its own set of jokes. But here we are discussing it anyway; the truth is in our brief tryst with Goregaon, we’ve already grown to love and respect it; the reason, Satkar Rice Plate House.
I know we do a lot of pieces about places with incredible seafood, but we often go in knowing exactly what to expect, Satkar was a bit different, we really didn’t know we’d find, would we discover something almost magical or would it be yet another hiccup in the tragic series of disappointments that is the life of a writer? Fortunately for us, Satkar Rice Plate House was nothing short of brilliant in every conceivable way.
In spite of being right opposite Goreagon station, Satkar is a bit tricky to find, it’s in a tiny crevice near a garment shop that leads to the back of a building. I’m not going to give you directions; part of the whole experience is risking life and limb in the back alleys of Goregaon, only to be rewarded with some of the best seafood you’ll ever have. To put it mildly, the lane Satkar Rice Plate House is shady and hardly appetising. It’s so shady you’ll be genuinely surprised when you walk into Satkar, which is one of the cleanest lunch homes we’ve ever seen. It isn’t just clean; it’s spotlessly white, just like I assume heaven is, but with more bombil fry.
We’ll get to the food in a bit, but I’d like to talk about the restaurant a little more. I already mentioned that it was really clean, something I’m a huge fan of (I pack a bottle of sanitizer every time I go North of Vile Parle) but even that isn’t what I love about it the most; what truly got me was the ambience; it didn’t feel like we were at a little lunch home opposite Goregaon station, I felt like we were dining at an old restaurant in the heart of Colaba (New Martin, maybe?), it was like being in a completely different dimension.
Now we can talk about the food.
Our only quarrel with Satkar’s food is that it made a list we’d prepared in July about the best seafood in Mumbai for less than 200 bucks completely redundant. The food was incredible; all of it. Here’s our humble assessment;
Crab Masala
Rs. 200
Satkar Rice Plate House’s crab masala was excellent. There’s no other way to put it. The curry was incredible and all, but we need to talk about the crab. Generally speaking, when you pay 200 bucks for crab you get exactly what you pay for, a small shrivelled up crab that’s barely the size of a spider; but not Satkar. Satkar’s crab, although small, was the best quality crab we’ve eaten so far on our adventures. It was full of sweet, juicy crabmeat, and was so fresh it was practically still moving.
Bombil Fry
Rs. 130
We like to consider ourselves experts of the subject of bombil fry, and after years of enjoying what’s essentially gutter scum deep fried in a batter so thick you don’t realise what you’re eating, we’ve grown accustomed to it. This might sound like too high a praise, but Satkar’s bombil is the best we’ve ever had. Better than Janata (Bandra), even better than Modern Lunch Home and Sion Lunch Home (Sion). We don’t know what it was, maybe it was something they did with the batter, or because it was perfectly marinated and seasoned, or maybe because it was fried crisp to perfection, I don’t know, all I can say is once you try it, you’ll know exactly what we mean.
Prawns Fry
Rs. 260
Satkar’s prawns fry was a complete surprise; 260 bucks for a single dish at a lunch home isn’t all that cheap, but my God it’s worth every penny. The prawns weren’t some tiny shrimp like we usually got at restaurants like these, they were pretty big, fried to perfection, and much like the bombil, tasted amazing. And if you’ve seen the picture, they’re gorgeous.
Looks like we’re going to be visiting Goregaon a lot more often.
