A trip to Curry Hill and a spice store

So this weekend we met some family friends at the Madras vegetarian chain gone global, Saravanaas, in NYC's Curry Hill neighborhood.

The food was excellent and spicy, but the service was weak --enough so that I'm not sure I would go back. They charge gratuity on the bill, which is legal in NYC if you disclose that, but I think when a venues opts for that there must be a reasonable level of service. I walked out thinking the service sucked and I don't think I'd go back. You can see the enormity of their fried bread known as poori's on the left side. The specialty of the house are the crispy rice griddle cades called dosai, also in the picture to the right

Afterwards, we went two streets up to the famed specialty spice store, Kalustyan's which stocks a massive array of spices known along with an incredible range of dried food and grains. I counted something like 30 different kinds of rice alone. They do a substantial amount of business to the restaurant trade, so their pricing for retail customers is on the high side. But its helpful to shop there just to see all the different things they have.
While we were there, we picked up a number of exotic spices that we can't easily find including florals like rosewater, jasmine, and lavender. Then in the picture to the right, you can see the big jars of goods, where we found glaceed orange rinds, apricots, and blanched almonds. Then in the powdered spice section we got some file powder, biryani blend, and Japanese dried bonito flakes. And then we also found some sour cherry juice, Peruvian hot sauces, and dried morels. It was quite the expensive shopping trip.