We got a chance to eat at Divine Curry at Hillsborough, New Jersey on Saturday night.

Though it was about half an hour away from my place, since it had opened recently around the end of December 2009, we thought it was worth it to drive to Divine Curry and taste their dishes.

Divine Curry restaurant is located on Beekman Road, off Amwell Road, which is about a mile away from the 206 and Amwell Road intersection.

We reached there at around 8.30pm and the restaurant was almost full. It looked new with the fresh a nice ambience and decoration. The cutlery was all gold coated and gave the typical authentic five star hotel feeling in India.

As soon as we got seated, we were served with papad. As it was oily, I was reluctant to eat it and they immediately got us roasted papad, and it was a nice gesture from their side.

Radhika got Mullighatany Soup while I had the tomato soup. She said her mullighatany soup was quite good and also gave me some background about its name. She said mullighatany soup actually is ‘Milagu Thanni’ soup (In tamil, milagu means pepper and thanni means water) and that the British started calling it as mullighatany as it was easier for them to pronounce. Not sure if the story is true, but sounds true 🙂

For appetizer, we got the Vegetable Pakora and Panneer Tikka. Panneer Tikka was nice and I enjoyed eating it. Vegetable Pakora was too salty to eat and we left it untouched.

We have Aalu Paratha, Bhindi Masala and Tandoori Chicken for the main course.

Aalu Paratha was quite soft. We liked it, especially Sachin had it with some tomato soup, as he liked that combination.

Bhindi Masala was tasting ok, but the lady’s finger (also called Okra in this part of the world) was tasting like it was over 100 years old and so it was impossible to bite it. We immediately reported it to them and they were kind enough to take it back and not charge us for that. Also, forgot to mention, they forgot to bring white rice with Bhindi Masala, not sure what they were expecting me to eat it with – though their menu says white rice comes with Bhindi Masala.

Tandoori Chicken was also ok, nothing great about it. I guess it was not marinated well enough and so had a very average taste.

That night, they had given Dal as a complimentary item for all the guests at the restaurant. It did taste quite good. As our experience was not so good, they also gave us complimentary dessert items – Mango ice cream and Kulfi. We realized that the Mango ice cream was directly from the mango ice cream tub that we get in any Indian store here. Kulfi was good – wish it was a bit less icy.

Trust me, I am one of the most compromising people when it comes to food, but I believe this one was beyond my tolerance limits.

Overall, it was a very average experience – we definitely will not be going to this place in the near future. It is worth giving a try if you are in the Hillsborough area.