Cherries & Berries – First Visit

As people who know me would know, I have been doing this food blogging thing only for less than a year and so its quite possible that there are places in Trivandrum where I should’ve been and written about long time ago… I feel this is one such example because Cherries & Berries have existed for quite a while and I only got the chance to visit there and try their food today… This is mostly because I don’t go out on a regular basis and also because the place where I live is more than 15km from Trivandrum city and so visits to the city is quite rare… So, C&B has been a place quite a few of my friends has been recommending to me for quite sometime and today, I went there for lunch as I happened to pass by the Vazhuthacaud area…

First of, loved the artwork on the walls, example shown in the pic below… I sat down at one of the corner tables and before too long I was handed the menu… I first got really surprised at the size of the menu, as in physical size… When I opened it, it was clear why it was so big and its because they have included pretty large photographs of each and every item in the pages, which were thick and laminated… Kind of reminded me of the menu from the old Oasis restaurant at Kesavadasapuram, which looked exactly like this, but with different content of-course… 🙂

So, one of the friends who recommended this place to me (who in sheer coincidence happened to walk in for lunch shortly after I placed the order 🙂 ), had recommended that I try their burger and so, I went for what they call the C&B Royal Chicken Burger and their Iced Tea of which I chose the Blackcurrant & Vanilla add-on option among quite a few in the menu… Having skipped breakfast today, I was quite hungry and so when I saw the neighbouring table being served a burger, I felt I may need something more and so, went for their Classic Spaghetti Bolognese as well…

So, first lets talk about the burger… The one I got is called the C&B Royal Chicken Burger… According to the menu, this burger consists of a Burger Bun filled with Grilled Chicken Breast, Fried Egg, Lettuce, Tomato, Onion, Gherkins, Cheese, Mayo and Ketchup… It arrived as shown in the pics below, with the lettuce and the veggies at the bottom layer with some mayo on the slice of the bun at the base; on top of it, was a slice of the bun with ketchup smeared on it with the chicken resting on it and above the chicken was the fried egg and then above it all were the cheese and the top slice of the bun with mayo on it’s underside… The only thing I found missing even though mentioned in the menu were the Gherkins…

Overall, this was an OK burger for me with the Chicken been cooked fairly well and seasoned well as well… The Mayo used and the veggies, I felt could use a bit more seasoning, the fried egg even though was clearly done using butter, ended up being slightly overdone and the bun was soft but it basically disintegrated as I was cutting into it and the bun didn’t taste fresh… Personally I prefer buns that are soft and light but not that soft and airy that it disintegrates on the slightest touch that making it impossible to hold the burger as you eat it… A way to solve the disintegration problem in such buns is toasting them on the grill… But here, clearly they didn’t do that…

As I was having the burger, the waiter brought me the Spaghetti Bolognese… Traditionally, the Spaghetti Bolognese even though it has non-italian origins, is made with cooked Spaghetti pasta tossed in the Bolognese sauce, which is a sauce also called Ragù alla Bolognese (essentially meaning the sauce from Bologna, which is in Italy) with strong Italian roots thats made using Tomatoes and a minced meat, usually mined Beef or Pork, even though modern versions have used lamb and even chicken… According to the menu here however, what they call their Classic Spaghetti Bolognese consists of Spaghetti with Keema, Basil, Onion along with their classic Tomato Sauce (I guess they meant Pomodoro) and Mozzarella…

First of, I am not sure what the meat used in the Keema was… Cause, at one point I could taste Chicken while others it felt like the Mutton and sometimes I could even taste Beef… So, its either a mix of various minces or something that I don’t remember the taste of like Pork… So, for now I am calling it as mystery meat keema… 🙂 So, inspite of the mystery, the Keema was well seasoned and cooked well… The Spaghetti itself was cooked to the perfect al dente… However, I found it missing one key ingredient which is the Tomato… Even according to the menu, its supposed to have the classic tomato sauce, but I found that to be completely missing… So, all I could taste was the Keema and the taste of caramelised onions… The mozzarella used turned out to be the Americanised processed one rather than fresh, but thats okay… I think overall, if it had the pomodoro, it would’ve been a great pasta dish…

As a drink, I had gotten the Iced Tea and had been sipping it all along as it was the very first item to be served to me… The one I got is their Blackcurrant & Vanilla variant and how they do these variants are by adding syrups to the iced tea… It was served in a sealable jar as shown in the pics above and it was sweeter than I had expected, but was indeed very refreshing to have… This is not the typical powder mix or green tea based iced tea but rather they seem to have made black tea using teabags and poured it in the jar filled with ice along with the teabag… So, it was quite strong as well and so the small jar serving is quite justified… The only catch however was that I couldn’t taste the Blackcurrant in it… Vanilla however was strongly present standing equally with the Tea…

So, overall a lunch that left with me with some mixed feelings but at the same time also quite promising so that I do feel like going back there again and try more from their menu… So, hopefully will do so when I go towards the city next…