All right this one is about Dine Esty. Dine Esty is a Chinese Japanese restaurant in Gurgaon, near the Huda City Center, in the building adjoining the Radisson Suites. Now there is a bit of history to my experiences to this restaurant. This restaurant has been there for close 10 years now. I have been in Gurgaon since 1999 and I had seen this restaurant over the years. I had in my initial years headed out to Bercos for a few years and the Golden Dragon. Due to certain shortcoming on these places, I started with Dine Esty and boy, its been good. Over the years, if I have to go to Chinese in Gurgaon- this is the place for me.
The interiors are pretty good, modern and yet a bit with the Chinese influence. The music is normally western. As you enter, there is a bar to the left. Further in and on the right is the diner section. Further ahead, there is a kitchen where they make sushi and sashimi. I have probably gone there innumerable times so I’ll talk about a few dishes.
In terms of starters, my regular favorite is the chicken salt and pepper, which is usually smaller pieces of diced chicken, which is golden fried in a batter, and with garlic and spring onions. This is the best starter in my humble opinion, which I order almost every time. There is the Xian chilli chicken with bigger pieces of chicken fried with stripes of capsicums.
The serve a large variety of dim sums, although to be honest, I prefer momos’s outside , but that’s my choice and taste. I did try recently the Singapore chilli prawns. They were a bit sweet and spicy at the same time. Again wet, sticky and gooey texture with red sauce. The prawns Id say were just descent and I have had recently much better prawns at canton spice co. The prawns were probably a bit smaller and that you felt that there was too much of batter which made the prawn less to find. Not bad, but not that great.
In the soups, my favorite is the Mun Chow soup with minced onion, veggies and chicken soup. This usually comes topped with the crispy fried noodles on the top. Other wise, you can go for the hot sour soup, lemon coriander or the Talumein. All the soups are good. The only soup which I didn’t seem to like is the sweet corn soup, which seemed canned soup to me in texture.Coming to main course, I usually go in for the chicken in hot garlic sauce. The Kung Pao chicken is great. Also, the chicken in XO sauce, and home style are great. I really like there sauces and they are really good. The chicken with bamboo shoot and black mushroom seem to be pretty bland and simple.
They do serve crab, whole fish, lamb and pork, although I don’t have a review as I usually stick to the chicken. In the fish, I can tell you that the fish in butter chilli pepper garlic is very tasty and recommended. With veggies and a white sauce, I love this preparation of fish.
The one dish that I always have here is also the American chopsuey. Now I don’t know whats so American, but the crispy fried noodles topped with hot red tangy sauce with chicken and topped with a fried egg. Boy, it is a delight to see the egg yellow break and spread over the sauce. A spoonful of this with crunchy noodles getting soaked in the sauce.
The fried rice, corn kernel and spring onion rice are good. The mixed fried rice is also my favorite. The pan fried noodles, are also good, they are crispy on one end and a bit soft and liquidy on the other end. It comes with loads of veggies, so don’t under estimate the quantity. The hakka noodles and chilli garlic noodles are pretty standard.
So all in all, the food quality is very good. Now different people have different perceptions of what Chinese should be. For me, most of the Chinese you get in India is Indian Chinese at the end of the day. I personally love this more than anything else. Staying abroad, I have had Chinese, but I don’t exactly like it. In India, the Indian Chinese has more pronounced flavors, more garlic and chilli, more crispy fried.
So essentially, I love Dine Esty and it satisfies my craving for Chinese. I call Bite Quest and get an additional 15% discount. The overall cost of this restaurant is a bit on the higher side, where a meal for two may cost approx. Rs 2000- Rs 2500/-.
My recommendation is yes for a visit to this place. I would definitely go again.
Time Square Building, B Block, Sushant Lok 1, Gurgaon
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