Pulusu: for South Indian food lovers

On this weekend, I was in mood to have a nice vegetable fry (south Indian style) or a steaming hot rasam, sambhar for dinner. So, I was pleasantly surprised when upon visiting pulusu, I came to know that unlike some of the other south Indian restaurants in the city, Pulusu had a south Indian a la carte section with a reasonably good spread.

So, let's begin this review with a look at the ambience. I thought it was pretty run of the mill. It's a fine dining restaurant, nothing extraordinary. The service was pretty decent, neither mind blowing nor disappointing. Alright, now that service and ambience are out of the way, let's take a look at the food.

Pulusu's menu pre-dominantly contains south Indian delicacies with a smattering of Chinese and North Indian dishes. It's a family styled restaurant which serves vegetarian and non-vegetarian delicacies from North Indian, South Indian and Chinese cuisines along with flavorsome and refreshing soft drinks. It does such a great job of bringing authentic regional flavours to your table that a full-course meal feels like a little whirlwind tour of the state we call home. As are the chicken chettinad, the gongura mamsam and the absolutely delish chaapa vepudu (fish fry).

All of these dishes go great with the classic perugannam (wonderfully spiced curd rice) or steaming ghee-rice with karam podi.
There's a lot of traditional Andhra non-vegetarian stuff nevertheless, mouth-watering names like Natu Kodi Iguru, Chapala Pulusu, Kodiguddu Ulli Iguru, Ulavacharu and Mamsam Pulusu. There's a pretty elaborate North Indian or Chinese menu otherwise too, with all the standard soups, starters, rice items, noodles and curries. Pulusu expectedly is big on home delivery, given its location in an up market residential neighbourhood.

Housed at Sri Nagar Colony in Hyderabad, the restaurant provides seating for over 60 people. Pulusu's prices surprised me, I was expecting them to be a lot higher than they ultimately turned out to be, and that was a pleasant surprise for sure. Nominally, the average expense at the restaurant ranges in between Rs 250 to Rs 500 which can be paid in cash or through credit card. Few of the customer convenience services at Pulusu comprise of waiter service, reservation, valet parking and take away.

All in all, if you are a fan of south Indian food, Pulusu, I think, is worth a visit.

—Anubha K. Singh