Things that go bump in the night.

Last night Win and Jim treated us to a meal in Sindhu, the contemporary Indian restaurant on board. Eating here has become something of a tradition when sailing on the Azura and this trip was no exception. Despite Sylvia’s protests I managed to photograph an assortment of the dishes on offer. The meal started with some complementary mini popadoms with chutneys followed by a pre-starter of a chicken pakora. Sylvia for her starter had chosen the “Karara Kekda” a crisp fried soft shell crab which is pictured below

.

I decided on the “Gosht Ke Dhuandhar Sooley”, a marinated smoked beef skewers with a mushroom ketchup.

Both dishes were cooked and presented superbly, Sylvia describing the crab as “very tasty” but not like a Cromer crab. For the mains Sylvia went for Atul Kochhar’s signature plate, three separate dishes of Lamb Rogan Josh, Chicken Murgh Korma and Cod Jal Pari.

My choice was the “Batak Falliyan” duck breast cooked in Punjabi masala and served in a three bean stew.

The mains were served with warm Indian breads, boiled rice Bombay potatoes and dahl. The portions are not large but the flavours are, with the subtle taste of the various spices and herbs hitting your palette with every mouthful. A great culinary experience.

Quite often the sweet course in an Indian restaurant is disappointing  but here the choice was good, with Jim having an Indian chocolate pudding and Win a Rhubarb souffle with a pistachio crumble topping, a kind of deconstructed rhubarb crumble. Sylvia choose a “Berry Bhatia Doi”. This was described as a yogurt cheesecake but it was like a glass of condensed milk with fruit on top. Absolutely gorgeous.

I had the straight forward option of a trio of Indian ice cream.

As always the food was good and the company was brilliant. Thank you Win & Jim.

After the meal we went to the theatre to see the company perform “Curtains Up’ a selection of West End numbers and then retire to our rooms. Normally that would be the end of the blog but the noise I reported on last night came back with a vengeance tonight. The banging and creaking experienced previously meant that neither Sylvia or I could get to sleep so eventually I phoned reception to report the problem. The duty manager was despatched to check out the problem and he raised a carpenter from his bed to rectify the situation. By the time the chippy had arrived it was 2.00 in the morning and after a short time diagnosing the problem began to hammer in wedges in the wall. This substantially relieved us of the problem but obviously didn’t go down too well with our downstairs neighbours who started banging on the ceiling in reply. 

Following return visits today from the carpenter and the housekeeping supervisor we are hopeful the problem will not reoccur tonight and so is the very irate lady below who also paid us a visit. 

Tonight is a formal night and tomorrow the first of two days in Reykjavik.