The restaurant which is located in the bylanes of Kalbadevi, south Mumbai, away from the bustling corporate offices of Nariman Point, offers as many as 216 seafood preparations from 17 different countries and is a gastronomical delight for the corporate-in-a-hurry.

The green signpost hanging outside its white facade beckons you to this charming restaurant. The ambience is of an old galley ship with chains hanging from the ceiling, portholes, pulleys and wrought-iron garden chairs and an old winding telephone which actually works! The interiors were crated by the owner, Mr Ashok Shetty and the architect, Mr Clement D'Silva. "It was a dream to have a seafood restaurant that would specialise and serve the cuisine from around the world, right here in the heart of Mumbai," Mr Shetty.

The restaurant was in its early avatar a well-known and flourishing Udipi eatery run by Mr Shetty's father. When the old patriarch retired, the son decided to change not just the decor but upgrade the menu so that a certain clientele would patronise the restaurant mainly for its international cuisine.

From February 1, the restaurant will also have thali lunches primarily aimed at corporates. The corporate-in-a-hurry can choose from three varieties of thalis: vegetarian, non-vegetarian and seafood.

The vegetarian thali costs Rs 195, a non vegetarian thali Rs 225 and the seafood thali, Rs 255. And not included in the thali, but a great hit nevertheless, is the Byculla souffle-a great dessert not served anywhere but here.

We decided to have a typical Mangalorean vegetarian thali. It consisted of two vegetables, a curry, rasam, condiments and a payasam. One can choose from a host of accompaniments like neer dosa, appam, rotis and rice. The neer dosas were paper thin, neatly folded and tied with a strip of banana leaf, were divine. However, the appam was a bit too thick. The rasam was good. The gravy and the dry vegetable were not spicy and I wished there was one spicy dish to even out the thali.

The non-vegetarian thali has a chicken curry, a fish curry, dry chicken or mutton, and the rest is same as the vegetarian thali. The sea food kthali has a prawn curry, a fish curry, either a squid, prawns or crab fired, other than the accompaniments.

The Bay of Bombay is worth checking out not only for the ambience and definitely the food.

-Sulekha Nair