Zaaffran - Darling Harbour

Ok, long story short.

So I was playing the hostess one Saturday night and I wanted to make something impressive. Something I've never made before: Mamak's famous chicken curry (Mamak is a famous Malaysian restaurant here in Sydney). But as it happens in life sometimes, the harder you try, the more you stuff up.

Somewhere between my replacing ground chili with ground cayenne pepper labelled 'extra hot' and forgetting to add lemongrass and curry leaves, I took a taste of my pot of boiling orange gravy and immediately felt my throat tighten...then eventually beads of sweat formed on my forehead...need water! NOW!

I was too embarrassed to photo evidence of such 'curry'. If I did, I'm sure the photo would lie, because surprisingly the pot of curry looked rather decent. It really did. But I don't think I can live with looking at those photos without horrible memories coming to haunt me.

Lessons learnt. Let's move on. I will come back to cooking curry one day once I get over this. Really.

Okay, so there's one place you can go to to avoid having curry disasters in the kitchen. A place that's guaranteed to serve delicious and authentic Indian food without the potential risk of hazardous choking on overly spiced food. Oh, should I mention, it has a beautiful view over Darling Harbour too?

View from the table

Mango Lassi - $6

This is without doubt my favourite mango lassi! The taste of cardamon was so fragrant and I couldn't stop myself from drinking it before the food came out.

Whole lamb shanks slow cooked in an onion, tomato, and yoghurt sauce

BIRBALI NULLI - $29.5

The lamb shank was delicious and so tender. The sauce went well with the garlic naan that was provided.

Garlic Naan

Briyani: Rice and chicken with Garam Masala, Mint, Saffron and nuts combined under flaky pastry. Served with Raita - $29.80

According to my Indian colleagues, the chicken briyani served in this restaurant is the best and most authentic he's tried in Sydney. It took a while for this dish to be served as they have to bake the pastry on top of the rice and chicken for 25 minutes. For me, this is the highlight of the night as I could taste a lovely and interesting combination of spices with each mouthful of the rice and and the chicken buried underneath. The cool and refreshing raita was a great accompaniment to the rice...yummm!

I'll be back here again soon...even though it is on the pricier side, the quality of the food definitely makes it a worth while experience!

Oh, and if you have entertainment book, you get 25% off too ;)

Zaaffran
Harbourside Centre

Darling Harbour

Sydney NSW 2000‎

Tel: (02) 9211 8900‎