The New Punjab Club brings old-world frontier flavours to Anna Nagar's food scene

CHENNAI: Another new spot that popped up in the ever-growing culinary landscape of Anna Nagar is The New Punjab Club. Located on a bustling lane in the Second Avenue of Anna Nagar East, the ambience of the diner is beautifully contrasting to the world outside.

A rustic, vibrant, and spacious atmosphere also has the advantage of outdoor seating.

Talking about the cuisine offered at The New Punjab Club, brand chef Rajat Gurung explains, “It took a year of R&D for us to come up with this unique cuisine and meticulously curate the menu. The focus is on the northwest frontier regions before the partition, including Punjabi cuisine, taking us back to the old-world charm.”

The area manager, Bhupinder Singh, feels that there will be immense growth in the culinary world. “The flavours we offer here are hard to spot in the city,” he adds. As Anna Nagar is already crowded with many diners in different forms, we asked Chef Rajat about choosing the neighbourhood for starting the restaurant. “Though the locality has many restaurants offering unique cuisines, there is a lack of an Indian fine dining eatery here. We wanted to bridge that gap,” he notes.

Taking a journey to the northwest frontier region, we tried the smooth and velvety murgh badami shorba, a chicken soup with black pepper and almond flakes. From an array of unique dishes in the starters, we were stunned by the flavours of Peshawari murgh tikka. The meat was cooked to perfection. The creamy sesame-crusted malai broccoli is a must-try even for those who dislike cauliflower. The meat pieces in the perfectly tandoored tiger prawns with a butter topping blew our minds. Bharwan paneer tikka was spicy with soft cottage cheese pieces.

Aloo tokri chaat was not just unique in taste, but also in its presentation. In the main course, do not miss their mutton rogan josh and paneer pasanda roll, accompanied by naan and tandoori roti. Chooza murgh makhani, chicken cooked in a tomato-based gravy, is next on our list of drool-worthy dishes.

Ending the experience on a sweet note, the rasamalai tres leches just won our hearts, with creamy milk sauce and fluffy cake.

Overall, The New Punjab Club gets a ten-out-of-ten for its well-lit, welcoming ambience, lip-smacking dishes, and adequate portion sizes.