"Benda kalu ooru......."

The legend goes that King Veeraballa once lost his way in a forest. Hungry and dead tired, he came upon a hut where he met an old Lady. Seeing a lonely traveller and a hungry face, she gave him some boiled beans (known as 'Benda Kalu' in Kannada). The King found these beans tastier than anything he had ever had ( he was freaking hungry for sure). In memory of this incident, he named the place "Benda Kalu Ooru" (place of boiled/cooked beans). Which then slowly became Bangalore, and now back to the roots with "Bengalooru".

Now tell me, a place whose name is all thanks to food, how could it be anywhere far behind when it comes to a discussion about street grub.

Fresh cut fruits and veggies, fresh juice shops, chat wale ki dukaane, pani puri stalls, benne dosai on the road, you name it and its there. Be it typically south Indian delicacies or even the North Indian chat pata's, they have it all... But the 2 places that make them so so so different are:

the Hot Chip shops and the Bakeries(Iyengar bakeries)

The variety that one gets at the Hot Chip shops is fantastic. From the simplest potato chips to the wierdest bitter gourd( Karela) chips which are green. They actually have these huge frying pans half filled with oil right outside the shop, and have fresh chips getting made on and off. Potato, jack fruit, Bitter gourd, Tapioca, raw bananas....variety is the spice of life... Why have those packaged, artificially flavoured, expensive to the roof wafers when u can have such awesome fresh chips right around the corner.

Iyengar bakery's are a boon to the society.

Where in France u get freshly baked croissants and in Italy the Focaccia is to die for early in the morning... here in bangalore the Iyengar Bakeries get u addicted to fresh breads and cookies and buns and cakes... You would just hate to buy those branded packed breads with expiry dates to check, once u've had from them.In fact I know of ppl who know exactly when, at what time, the breads come out baked into the bakeries and trust me they don last for more than 30 mins. They just disappear. And then you have to wait for the next lot to come out. The breads are super soft, the cakes super spongy and the biscuits... well thats how the cookie should crumble.