Hipsters Unite(!) – The Grammar Room
New Delhi, India
Delhi’s finally got its own taste of the hipster culture in the newly opened The Grammar Room. A restaurant within a restaurant, Olive in Mehrauli has finally converted their private party space into a cool ‘hip’ new café of sorts that’s helmed by the extremely capable Chef Sahil from CIA.
When you walk into the space, the carefully mismatched interiors catch your eye and there’s fluidity in even the oddest objects. You immediately want to walk out on to their narrow patio which is very chic but chances of getting a table there are quite dismal even on a Tuesday afternoon.
What I personally loved is the end wall with a funky sofa, coffee table laden with vintage games and a bookshelf stocked with Murakami. It’s insta-perfect with its simple tea cups doubling up as flower pots and the quirky tent card on the table that has been very well written by somebody I presume to be a grammar Nazi.
So you know from the beginning that you’re encouraged to spend ample time here, they don’t want you to dine and dash, read a book, play a game, fill out some unconventional adult colouring books and munch on their grammatically pun-ny menu. Personal touches like having the Maitre d's name on the menu and segregation of dishes with punctuation add to the uniqueness of this establishment.
The restaurant is teaming with hipsters and that reflects in the menu too. The hipster favourite Avo-toast is just right here and for me, it was better than the one at Caara Café because firstly, it was on 88bread and not sourdough and the Avocado smash had a distinct citrus flavour.
We followed that up with their recommended (!) Shrimp Eggs Benedict. The brioche was just right, the poached egg had the required wobble and the shrimp had a nice umami vibe going but all put together, I found it a tad too high on salt.
The winner here was the Egg Fried Rice. Perfect for a fussy eater like me to share, I could pick and choose my condiments and sauces from the bowl and the presentation and the flavours were spot on.
The cookie with milk dessert was also a delight. It takes you back to when you dunked gooey chocolate chip cookies into warm milk right before bed. The cookie does disintegrate rather quickly so it’s better to gobble this one up right when the vanilla-infused milk is poured.
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Service was personal, warm and friendly. We got all the right recommendations and spent a good afternoon here. This place literally is a hipster magnet and you see men wearing paisley shirts, women dressed in anti-consumerist, organic, home-grown and atrociously priced environmental-friendly clothes and so on. I also spotted at least 7 Maison Goyard totes while dining which only highlights the 'we're not following any trend that it's a trend' craze.
The open kitchen with its gleaming rational oven at the back is also a good touch but I wish their chefs wore hair nets.
Even though the vibe is strictly laid back, the food is taken very seriously here with the ingredients that speak for themselves, flavours are robust and even though it’s vastly different from Olive, the food is light, surprising and on fleek.
