On a merry-go-round :
The Pearl Of The Orient revolves on top of The Ambassador, one full circuit in 90 minutes. I eat little buns stuffed with minced chicken and dipped in a hot barbecue sauce, squid in black bean sauce, a bowl of Haka noodles with crisp pork. Both on the outside and inside, it is a lovely experience. Outside is a splendid view of the Fort at my feet, like from an aircraft with large windows, permanently circling over Bombay. And inside, there is jade and Chinese urns, and orchids on every table, and bonsai on sideboards. The bonus is the food: sharkfin and crabmeat and black mushrooms and Chinese cabbage and beancurd and a dry crisp lamb chilli and twice cooked pork. The view is free, so is the Chinese tea, the white chocolate, the ginger candy.

Kheema pau for breakfast
For VFM food, whether in New York or Bombay, head for the restaurant where the largest number of taxi drivers eat. In Bombay, it is Olympia on Colaba Causeway. Go for the breakfast, kheema-pau, over by 9.30 a.m.; bhaji gosht, over by 10 a.m.; mutton roast (the meat on the bone, the nulli below the goat�s knee), available only between 10 and 10.30 a.m. As the management says, with some logic: �A goat has only two knees, how much nulli can we make.�

Older than Bori Bunder
The Heritage Society should include it in its list. India�s, and world�s, oldest puri bhaji restaurant, Pancham Puriwalla at the mouth of the Parsi Bazar Street, in the old Bombay Fort. Baba Pancham is the great-great-grandfather of the present proprietors, when he arrived in Bombay and set up the shop, Victoria Terminus was still to be constructed.

All it sells, and has sold for a couple of centuries, is puris and a liquidy bhaji of potatoes and pumpkin, with a chilli and lime pickle, a couple of thousand servings a day.

Stopwatch meals
Boulevard, the coffee shop at the Orchid Ecotel, within striking distance of Santa Cruz airport, takes pride in its express service. If you select items from its lightning menu (soups, appetisers, curry, meat and vegetable dishes), the waiter places a stopwatch on the table, presses a button to start it, and goes to dispense the order. If the stopwatch shows a second over the 15 minutes, you don�t pay for the meal.

All very nice and reassuring as you make your way to the terminal for the flight, well in time. Then find that the flight is delayed by three hours.

Barberry Berries
They grow wild in the Middle East, on spindly shrubs, red berries. In Teheran, they call them zereshk and use in pulao. At Britannia, the Irani restaurant at Ballard Estate, near the Custom House, they use it with fine basmati rice and call it berry pulao, with best quality boneless meat, and a garnish of cashewnuts and fried onions, available all weekday afternoons. An aromatic pulao, they call it berry pulao. Let your nose guide you to it.

Buffalo�s dome and tail
For a more hearty breakfast, I suggest Valibhai Payawala�s Saat Handi at Bohri Mohalla, between Null Bazar and Gol Deval (Round Temple). One of the handis has trotters, the gelatine, fat and supple, sticking to the bone, then to the fingers. Other handis have tupa, which is the cattle�s dome, particularly meaty, and pichota (rump and tail). Doors open at 5 a.m., as hearty trenchermen descend from their homes with tiffin boxes. Buy lamba pau from the men at the two ends of the street.