Connaught Place (not to be confused with the Delhi CP) is a building located on the corner of the intersection of Mangaldas Road and Bund Garden Road. Once just a row of make-shift food stalls, this building now houses a handful of the old favourites like Fantasy Juice and Snacks Bar, as well as other quix-fix eateries. With plenty of offices, a school, and Wadia College within walking distance – it’s always buzzing with hungry students and office-going crowd. We decided to check out this modern ‘khau galli’ for ourselves, and here’s what we found.
Cheese Dabeli, Cold Coffee & More: How Bund Garden Khao Galli Won Us Over
What Is It?
Cafe 1 Plus 1 - AADD (M) AADD (B)
AADD – full form, All About Different And Delicious – serves thick shakes and fast food with a desi twist. Their signature AADD (M) and AADD (B) chocolate shakes are not unlike the CAD-B we grew up on, but they resent any comparison between the two. We tried their thick cold coffee (INR 30) which is their best-selling drink, and a veggie club sandwich (INR 50) layered with slices of potato, cucumber, tomato, pudina chutney, toasted and topped with grated cheese. There is limited seating here, if you’d rather sit down to eat.
Lavendor - The Resto Cafe
Lavendor ‘The Resto Cafe’ appeared to be most popular for their cutting chai (INR 10 for full, INR 7 for half) and dabeli (INR 10 for regular, INR 25 with cheese) – both available on-order via their front entrance. They also have limited seating space in a small upstairs section, and also serve more substantial eats, ranging from various types of pizza and pasta, to parathas, misal-pav, pav-bhaji, maggi, North Indian, South Indian, and Indo-Chinese cuisine. We ordered a cutting chai, and also spotted cream rolls (INR 10 each) and buttery bunmaska rolls (INR 20 each) – but managed to resist temptation.
Sai Kamal Snacks Center
Sai Kamal Snacks Center serves everything from tea and coffee to chapati-bhaji (INR 30/plate with 3 chapatis), idli-vada-dosa-uttapa, vada-pav, khari-pattice, and much more. We decided on a plate of 2 golden-looking samosas (INR 25), which were perfectly crunchy on the outside, and delicious on the inside. It’s an extremely popular spot for a quick lunch, and they were almost out of hot food by the time we reached them – so if you plan on heading here for lunch, we suggest you try to get in early.
Rudra Paan Shop
For those of you who prefer an after-meal paan, Rudra Paan Shop will sort you out. We found hand-rolled regular paan (INR 20), a strange ‘malai chocolate’ paan (INR 35), and their most popular chocolate-coated paan (INR 30). They also sell cigarettes, breath mints, and cold drinks – if you should feel the need to stock up before heading back to work.
Fantasy Juice Bar
Last, but not least – the legendary, decades-old Fantasy Juice Bar (which was a part of the original Bund Garden ‘chowpatty’) is now located within the interior ground floor of Connaught Place (Shop no. 49-50). Obviously, the best thing to order here are their famous fruit milk-shakes – served in generously-sized mugs. Rule of thumb here, is to always pick whichever fruit is in season – though strawberry, mango, and dry-anjir (fig) are their best-selling shakes. They also serve fresh fruit juice (obviously), and savoury snacks like pav-bhaji, veg pulav, pizza, and sandwiches.
#LBBTip
These ‘khau-galli’ joints are light on your pocket, so you can feast like a king without going broke. There are plenty of fresh juice centers, and even Rolls Mania and ‘Desi V Desi’ outlets here. Next to Rudraa Paan Shop is ‘Ice Street @ 18°C / Fruits & Flavours’ where aside from the obvious (ice cream), you’ll find well-stocked refrigerators of cold drinks and sodas, mukhwaas, farsaan, sweets, chips, chocolate, and even ‘upwas items’.