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Singh and I

It’s a mixed-up, muddled-up, shook-up world, as The Kinks’s Ray Davies once famously sang. Though that world sent him a dude disguised as a woman, it also happily delivered Hakka-style, East Indian-Asian fusion cuisine to this Prairie foothills city.

“That’s a thing?” you ask. Yes, it is. It’s an invention of Calcutta’s Chinese population, combining traditional Chinese dishes with Indian spices. It’s become very popular in India’s larger urban centres, but the cuisine has also gone international with the global growth of both Indian and Chinese expat communities. And it can be tasted at Singh and I, a new restaurant in Falconridge in the city’s northeast. Incidentally, Wicked Chili (17th Avenue S.W. and Symons Valley Road N.W.) also serves a selection of Indian-Hakka food, but that’s for another review.

Singh and I had a busy kiosk at this summer’s Taste of Calgary at Eau Claire Market. The evening I attended, the Singh gang was completely sold out, but they managed to bring in some Shanghai fish before closing. This appetizer goes for $9 at the restaurant. The tangy, orange popcorn-style fish pieces whetted my appetite for a broader sampling of this cuisine.

The restaurant is a bit tricky to find. Located behind Castleridge Plaza off Falconridge Drive, it’s in the Magnolia Banquet Hall. The room is dark and spacious, with table and booth seating.

Though the drinks menu offers non-alcoholic Indian favourites like chai ($3) and mango lassi ($4.50), the liquor selection sadly features neither Indian nor Chinese beverages unless you count the Singapore sling ($7.50). My guest and I went with Rickard’s White ($4.50).

The menu is not entirely fusion, but rather features a few select Asian-Indian dishes padded with a tight selection of straight-up Indian fare. For example, entrees include Chinese-inspired black-bean chicken ($14) and coconut chicken ($14), but also chicken tikka masala ($14) and butter chicken ($14). Since I’d already tried and liked the Shanghai fish, we started our meal with an appetizer of crispy chili potatoes ($9) — Chinese-style marinated potato slices sautéed in hot garlic sauce. This dish proved to be as good as the menu description. The potatoes were orangey-red, nicely balanced between crisp and saucy. Mixed in were chopped red onion, green onion and green pepper. The veggies gave the dish just the bit of crunch and greenery it needed.

Recommended by our server, we moved on to the Manchurian chicken ($14). Just like its namesake spy thriller, this candidate turned out to be an assassin — of our taste buds. It’s the uptown cousin of Western-Chinese buffet sweet–and-sour dishes. Eschewing that nuclear-waste-like neon colouring, this orange sauce had a sophisticated balance of spicy bite and bottom-end sweet. The chicken chunks were light and tender.

We also ordered tarka dahl ($12), a non-Hakka dish comprised of yellow lentils, onion, tomato, a masala spice mixture and chopped cilantro. This stewed dish was a fine complement to the hot-sweet punch of the chicken. Its savoury spice load carried the heat of the other dish like an emperor in a sedan chair. Sopping these generously portioned dishes up with a basket of good garlic naan ($3) was really satisfying.

After a great big leisurely dish of mango ice cream ($4), liberally dusted with crushed pistachio, and a dish of gulab jamun ($4) — round, cake-like milk balls in sugar syrup with a coconut dusting — we were full.

This cuisine import, I’m happy to report, is a winner. Singh and I is well worth the short search it’ll take you to find the place.