MadMan's BitchBlog

I'm doing a 2-day workshop on starting your own restaurant this Saturday at Shiok, my restaurant.

The workshop will give an overview of the restaurant business, types of restaurants, government regulations and paperwork, menu planning, financial planning, staffing, equipment, etc.  

If you know somebody who would be interested, please do let them know.

The full details are here: http://ireboot.in/restaurant

Last week saw some serious drop in business across malls, restaurants, hotels, airlines, and other such places. I expected a small drop because of the Bombay terrorist attacks, but in fact it turned out to be about 40%. As I waited for guests, I decided to phone and ask fellow restauranteurs how things were going. The word "dead" was the usual reply. The clubs, already hurt by the clamp on nightlife in Bangalore, got hit more. When I enquired at one well-known club, I found that they had gone to another club to figure out how much business they had, and both were doing very little.

Then a fellow chef friend showed me an SMS he had got. Apparently it was doing the rounds in Bangalore. It warned people not to go to movies, malls, and restaurants till 07 December because of some alleged army intelligence that there was going to be a terrorist attack. And people were relentlessly forwarding it to everyone they knew.

Unfortunately, this is exactly the kind of fear that terrorists try to create. That's their line of business - to disrupt lives of citizens and make them afraid for their lives. And when people forward such messages without having any first hand knowledge, they actually do the terrorists' work for them. Fear propogates, and thanks to technologies like the Internet and SMS, it propagates faster.

I for one refuse to forward such messages. I will not live my life in fear. I will not let the bloody terrorist have the satisfaction of seeing that his work has been successful. And the rest of us should not either. For how long will you keep it up anyway? Statistically, you are more likely to die in a car accident than a terrorist attack. Do we then stop using our vehicles too? And for how long will we let fear haunt us? A week? A month? A year? What happens after that?

So don't be a victim. Go out, watch movies, try restaurants, have a drink at a bar, and go on with my life just as before. It's a sad day when the terrorists physically kill a couple of hundred people, but kill the spirits of hundreds of thousands. Don't be part of that statistic.

As expected, shopping malls and hotels now appear to be increasing their security by making you stop your cars and checking in your boot for explosives and arms.

I guess the terrorists will now find it harder to carry out their activities.

OK, who are we kidding? The majority of the "security" business in this country is laughable. They are more for casual deterrence than any real security. C'mon, these fellas get paid 3000-4000 per month. They come from some village for a job, get put into a uniform, and thrown into an office or mall. If it's a half-decent agency, they might give them some basic lessons on how to maintain an attendance register and seat guests. All those 20 year olds or 60 year olds you see at bank ATMs... they're not going to put any credible defence against anything more than a drunk guy. I could blow hard on some of them and they'd fall over. I asked my last agency's guards (a well-known player in the market) whether they got any self-defence lessons, and they said no. If somebody comes with just a hockey stick, those guys are going to be useless.

Which is why it annoys the hell out of me to see all the pointless security theatre in hotels and malls. While I wait for some clueless guy to look at the underside of my car, I try to think of all the ways I could create havoc in that place if I were a terrorist.. the number is frightening. Observe the procedures for one day and you can figure out numerous ways to smuggle in bombs, weapons... pretty much anything. Do those guards even know what to look for? Do they know that C4 looks like modelling clay and can be just tossed into your glove compartment? Or that using a metal detector inside a hunk of metal known as a car is ridiculous?

No, they have next to no training. They've just been told to look under your car with a mirror and look in the boot. Perhaps they expect to find one of those movie bombs with big red digital timers.

It's like copy-protection and product activation in software. The pirates crack the package anyway, and all it does is annoy legitimate users. Similarly, all this "checking" in malls and hotels only irritates genuine customers and visitors. Troublemakers - at least the ones with an IQ above 90 - will find one of the ways out that are readily apparent.

The problem is that some people might actually believe they're safer now. The reality is very different.

Hi folks. I'm happy to let you know that we're re-opening Shiok today evening at its new home on Inner Ring Road. We are also launching our new cocktail lounge called Moss on the first floor of the same building. Please do visit. You can find a map here. Our web site will be updated over the weekend. This is just an informal post to all my friends.

If you're wondering what the two new places look like, check out some photos: http://shiokfood.com/shiok-new.jpg (warning: 2 MB file)

I look forward to seeing you all soon. :)

PS: There's a 20% discount on everything until this weekend.

I had posted a while back about naming my new lounge and offering a prize for the winner. After much deliberation, I am happy to announce that madhav is the chosen one. The new lounge will be called "Moss", which was one of his suggestions. It fits in well with the whole nature theme we have going on. More importantly, Google says there's no bar with the same name out there (at least in the first couple of pages of results.) He wins a special meal + cocktails at my new restaurant when it opens.

Congratulations Madhav! :D

Murphy's Law is a bitch. My new restaurant and lounge project are taking longer than I planned due to various little things screwing up.

The latest blow comes in the form of the morons at Airtel, with whom we had lodged an application for phone line transfer about a month ago. The engineers came for a site inspection, and left. Now, four weeks later, we're being told that they can't shift our phone lines to the new location because they don't have any trenches in the Ring Road area, and can't provide phone lines there.

This is a serious pain in the ass. It means we have to get another line from either BSNL or Tata Indicom, and give up the phone number we've used for the last 4.5 years: 4116 1800, a number that is listed in various directories and web sites, not to mention in the phonebooks of all our customers. There's so much potential business that could be lost right there. And Tata Indicom says they don't offer a "hunting" facility: Having one number act as a front to 3 different lines, a feature we used for the Airtel number. I'll have to get multiple phone numbers instead. :(

Anyway, painting work has started, so we should be getting done in another two weeks. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that nothing else gets screwed up.

I've always been a fan of Nokia phones, and three out my last four phones have been Nokia. I like the interface design, which is important for me.

My current phone is a Nokia 6300, which replaced my trusty 6110 that lasted 4 years. I bought it only because I wanted a cameraphone to take casual snaps.

Terrible idea. The 6300 was slim and pretty, but the battery life was terrible. My 6110 went five days without needing a recharge; the 6300 barely goes two. (Nokia used a cheap Chinese battery and all my friends who bought this phone have the same problem.) The camera was pretty bad too. It would constantly take pics with a low colour temperature (giving pics a blue tint), unless you manually set the white balance first.

All this I could live with, but recently it has started showing a weird bug. If the phone is on the charger, and it rings, it will just hang when you pick it up, or some time during the conversation. All keys stop responding, the screen light goes off. Then I have to take the battery out, put it back in, and then switch the phone on. It's extremely frustrating.

So I need a new phone. I like Nokia models. Does anyone have any recommendations? The problem with moving to a model from another company is transferring all your contacts. With a Nokia phone, I can just back up from the current phone and restore to another one.

I don't need any fancy stuff. A simple phone with a half-decent camera is enough, and it should fit into my shirt pocket. Budget ~ 8-10K ideally, will spring another 2K if it's worth it.

As some of you may know, I am in the process of relocating my restaurant and lounge. The reasons are that my rent period at the current place is expiring, and the Bangalore Metro station is going to be constructed right next to the present site.

I've found an excellent location for the new place on Koramangala Ring Road, right before the tech parks where 60000 people work, so it should get me some decent business. I've taken two floors in a new building: one for my restaurant and the other for my cocktail lounge.

Here's where I need help. I'm still wondering what to name my new cocktail lounge. My old cocktail lounge was only about 500 sq ft, so I never bothered to give it a separate name. The new place, however, is three times bigger, is on its own floor, and even has a separate entrance. The look is very different from the restaurant below. While the restaurant will keep its focus on fine dining South-east Asian food, the lounge will serve a predominantly starter-oriented menu with dishes from all over the world (but the Asian influence will be there), or "whatever I feel like making for you". :)

We wanted the lounge to be an after-hours hangout/escape for all the people who work in the offices and tech parks in the vicinity. We've gone with a "natural" theme for the place - walls with moss and white colours, wooden seats with cushions, white marble tables. It has a waterfall of sorts on one wall, and a place for a singer in another corner. Lighting is soft, and we'll play mostly jazz, R&B, and retro music. The seating capacity is 60-62.

So do you have any ideas for a name? It needs to be simple, not pretentious, and not some foreign name nobody can pronounce right.

Winning suggestions will get a meal cooked by yours truly personally, and a few drinks to go along with it.

(The new place will open in mid-July. The old Shiok will close on 16th June.)

Bangalore folks have probably heard of the European restaurant "Herbs and Spice" in Indiranagar. It's run by Manjit Singh, a friend of mine. Manjit has just started a delicatessen in Whitefield with the same name. It sells their well-known desserts, as well as quiches and gourmet sandwiches. (The sandwiches will be introduced soon.)

Since Manjit changes his restaurant menu twice a week, I suggested that he start a web site to make his customers aware of the day's menu. And I adapted WordPress to do just that. So, ladies and gentlemen, I give you...

http://herbsandspice.in

The header images are from photos I've shot (full set is here.) Some stuff still isn't updated (like the "about page") but the main purpose is fullfilled. :)

Thanks to the calendar view, you can also check out previous menus.

So if you visit Herbs n' Spice, tell Manjit that I asked you to check out his site.

A bunch of us went to dinner at I.T.alia at The Park (the top-ranked Italian joint in town) to check out their new menu. Since one of us knew the chef, we got a "tasting menu" of some of their best food. The food was excellent, I must say.

And of course, I took lots of photos with my camera to share with you. Here are a few:



( More pictures inside )

And the rest (14 of them) are on my Flickr page.
So do check them out at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/themadman/

I posted this on the Flickr forum because I see this as serious incompetence on the part of Flickr.

I am a little pissed right now.

I wanted to upgrade to a Pro account and I thought Flickr accepted PayPal payments, so I clicked the order button. When I didn't find a PayPal payment link there, I sent a support request on June 18, asking this (Flickr Case 275732):

--
I have a regular Flickr account. My Yahoo id is [xxxxx].

I am trying to upgrade to a Pro account and I know that
PayPal is an option for payment, yet the payment page shows
only Yahoo Wallet and does not offer me PayPal as an
option.
Why is this happening?
--

to which I got this response the same day:

--
Hello,

Thank you for contacting Flickr Customer Care.

Flickr's PayPal email address is:

paypal@flickr.com.

Thank you again for contacting us. If you have any other
questions,
please feel free to reply to this email.
--

So of course I went to my PayPal account and sent $24.95 to paypal@flickr.com

A week goes by and my account is still not upgraded, so I sent another support email (Case 281782) asking Flickr to please look into the issue and see if my funds have been received. I gave my transaction ID as well.

I went nuts because I got THIS response from Flickr:

--
I am very sorry but we stopped accepting payment by PayPal
as of June 12. Please contact PayPal immediately to cancel
your transaction.

We can only accept payment through Yahoo! Wallet at this
time: just follow the links on the order page to remit a
payment to us
flickr.com/account/order

Regards,
Ana
--

WHAT on earth? Are you kidding me? If you stopped accepting PayPal payments on June 12, why did you:

a) send an email on June 18 (six days AFTER), giving me an email address to send funds to, after I sent a support request specifically asking for PayPal payment information?

b) continue to have a section in your help section dealing with PayPal payments, which doesn't say anywhere that you don't accept PayPal any more? In fact, it says I should simply wait a few days for the transaction to go through.


I don't see where I have done anything wrong in this matter. This is a serious screw-up by the people responsible for support. Even your documentation is out of date. How am I supposed to get my money back now? PayPal's site doesn't even have any information on cancelling a transaction. Why should I have to pursue PayPal to get my money back eh?

I don't think I want a Pro account any more. :(

Just had an interesting phone conversation with my father. He calls up to ask about some stuff, and after we're through, here is how the conversation goes:

Father: People have been calling me up to congratulate us on you getting married.

Me: Huh?

Father: Lots of people think you're getting married.

Me: What on earth? Who's been telling them that?

Father: (laughs) Well, word has been spreading that K P Menon's son is getting married, so most people just assume it's you and are calling me up to say how great it is that Madhu is getting married.

Me: (laughs loudly) Ohhhhh... well, I guess you have to tell them it's the wrong son getting married. Or maybe it's the right son, depending on one's perspective. Or maybe it's a son... oh well, the other son at any rate.

(At this point, I can sense him sighing silently at being unable to get me to talk about the prospect of getting hitched, and I try to avoid the awkward silence and quickly talk about other things.)

Finally, I have managed to get past my laziness and post a new recipe on my chef blog. This one is for Thai Tom Kha soup.

Picture of the darn thing:

The American Idol final is being shown tonight, but I don't really give a rat's arse who wins it. Melinda Doolittle, the best singer by a mile in the competition, was voted out last week, and my interest in the show departed with her. That lady was a pro!

As someone on the Television Without Pity forum wrote, this year's final three results were just like last year: the best singer got thrown out, and the final was between the Disney Princess and the guy with a gimmick. So true.

Teenagers with mobile phones are capable of ten times more votes than regular people. So shrieky Jordin will probably win. Pity.

Well, the good news is that the healthy eating plan I've been following for the last 2 weeks or so seems to be paying off and I have actually lost an inch or so around my waist. I've been eating food like this:



That's a steamed chicken and rice dish. The chilli-ginger sauce in the background gives it added punch without adding calories.

The eating plan can be summarised as follows:

1) Eat smaller meals more frequently. 5 main meals and two healthy snack meals in between.

2) Follow the rule of thirds on your plate: 1/3 carbohydrates, 1/3 protein, 1/3 veggies

3) Cut out all refined flour and sugar-based products. Eat foods with complex carbs instead. (For instance, whole wheat bread instead of white bread, and eliminating all soft drinks.)

4) Drink enough water. In this heat, that's about 3-4 litres a day.

5) Avoid foods high in saturated fat.

6) One meal in a week, you are allowed to eat something that breaks the rules, but don't go overboard with it.


In keeping with rule #6, I decided to go meet a couple of friends for lunch at Spiga restaurant on Saturday. The place was way too crowded, and we got dumped on a table that was designed only for two people. (And not a fan in sight!)

The lighting was a bit low because we were right behind a wall, but I managed to get some decent shots of the desserts we had. I could only squeeze in a couple of shots each because the others were in a hurry to eat. ;)

Please do not go any further if you don't want to see food pictures.

( Pictures of our desserts )

Apparently, a judge in Jaipur has issued a warrant for Richard Gere's arrest after he destroyed Indian culture by kidding Shilpa Shetty on the cheek a few times. I quote:

'After examining video foot-age of the event, the judge said that the stars’ behaviour was “highly sexually erotic”, “transgressed all limits of vulgarity” and “denigrated” Indian culture and social values.'

Wow, I wonder what he'd say about a sex scene in a movie.

For crying out loud, please save us from these self-appointed protectors of our "culture". I wish our country would be truly free instead of just pretending to have freedom. We have idiots who file cases like this and are just waiting for a chance to be offended. We have judges who issue warrants over a peck on the cheek when the lady being kissed had no problem with it. Will we ever have a country where people just live and let live?

"Khans off the big list", screams today's Times of India on its front page, complete with a picture of Amitabh Bachan greeting guests at the sangeet ceremony of his son's wedding. The story hogs most of the attention.

"Car bomb kills 140 in Baghdad", on the other hand, gets a cursory one-line mention in the left column.


I am so glad the Slimes of India has its priorities straight over what is newsworthy.

Update: You can find a digicam shot of the article here: http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/2911/madmanindiatodaykf8.jpg

To my Bangalore amigos: If you read India Today, please take a peek at the "Simply Bangalore" supplement on page 36 and you will see the intimidating photo of yours truly with a wok, along with a write-up.

The story angle? No prizes for guessing. If I weren't getting publicity out of it, I would be getting sick of my own story. ;)

In this corner, we have the design of the well-known New York Times

In the other corner, we have the design of the newly redesigned Hindustan Times.


Let's look at the first, then look at the second, then look again at the first...

Hmmm... "inspiration" or "copycat"? You decide.