Travel Diary: Amritsari Dhaba Trail

Total Distance Covered: 1193 kms

Total Duration: 4 days

Mode of Transport: Toyota Innova Crysta from Avis

Total Expenses (for 1 person): Rs. 30000 (approx.)

Places Covered: Murthal, Ambala, Chandigarh, Ludhiana, Amritsar, Jalandhar, Karnal

Snapshot of the Trip:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1wowjbk6G5gmJmQ5E51n6fL3o4mFeZQYydGrfr2nKXQg/edit?usp=sharing

Route Map

March 2018 (Whatsapp):

Me: Confirm karo yar Vietnam kab chalna hai?

Tejas: We need a mini trip before that. How does the Delhi-Nepal roadtrip sound?

Me: How about Delhi-Lucknow-Varanasi roadtrip?

Gourab: I have been wanting to do a dhaba hopping roadtrip from Delhi to Amritsar. What say you guys?

Me: Punjab? Although I am a Punjabi who has never been there, I have no interest in visiting that place. It's not my thing. We can eat the same food in Delhi anyway.

Gourab: Chal le na yar please. I really really want to do this.

Tejas: I am in.

Me: Ughhhh. Ok.

Tejas: I need a photo in a field full of sunflowers. Eshan, you must be knowing where we can find such fields, right?

Eshan: Of course yes. I will even let you drive the damn tractor which we have in our fields.

Day 1 (Delhi - Murthal - Ambala - Chandigarh):

Coincidentally, the three of us were flying down to Delhi from different locations and hence we picked up the self-drive car from the airport itself. The first Dhaba stop of our journey was going to be Gulshan Dhaba in Murthal. En route to Murthal, we encountered saw a field of sunflowers. Tejas got too excited and so we got down to click some photos.

Lol

Tejas and I were eating seemingly ordinary and bland food for a week so that we can really relish everything that we eat on this journey and eat to our heart's fill. Next stop: Gulshan Dhaba

We had 3 types of Tandoori Parantha - Mix, Aloo-Pyaz, Paneer along with Ma ki Dal and Chaas

Buterrrrr

Looked too colorful to ignore

Mirchi, It's hot

The beginning of this food hogging journey was excellent and after a few hours, it was time for having lunch at Puran Singh da Dhaba in Ambala.

When you reach the place, you will realise that there are 2 dhabas of the same name - Asli Puran Singh ka New Dhaba AND Puran Singh ka Vishal Dhaba. The former looked horrible and extremely unhygienic. On the other hand, the latter looked clean, had put up pictures of various celebrities and had more number of patrons. Guess where Gourab took us for lunch after doing a "LOT" of research? The former. Okayish food, shady as hell.

From the dhaba, we headed towards our hotel in Chandigarh. To pass the time, we were listening to some insane poetry by Tejas. Please enjoy (Caution: You might die after hearing this)

We reached the hotel by 4pm and decided to hog again. While Tejas and I decided to stay back at the hotel, Gourab got Chicken Momos and Veg Momos from Dumpling Wood, and Nachos Salad, Nutella Brownie and Brownie Chocolate Cake from Nik Baker's.

Since we had plenty of time to kill, we went to the movies to watch Avengers Infinity War. The original plan was to visit Pal Dhaba after the movie but decided to order the food lest the restaurant closed before the movie ended. So we had a not so great Butter Chicken, Shahi Paneer, and Dal Makhani.

Day 2 (Chandigarh - Ludhiana -Amritsar):

As soon as I got up, I had a craving for Lassi. Alas, most of the places were closed in the morning so we decided to check out Sukhna Lake which looks like a mini Marine Drive, but of course with lesser amount of people and more peaceful.

To be honest with you, Chandigarh mesmerised me. What a beautiful city!!! Wikipedia says - It was one of the early planned cities in post-independence India and is internationally known for its architecture and urban design. The master plan of the city was prepared by Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier, which transformed from earlier plans created by the Polish architect Maciej Nowicki and the American planner Albert Mayer. Truly, it is an incredibly planned city with really clean surroundings. Oh on that note, people seem to have an insane amounts of disposable income here. Why do I say that? I saw people taking horse riding classes on the road. HORSE RIDING CLASSES!!! I have never seen anything like that.

We had planned to have breakfast at Haveli in Ludhiana. We had a sumptutos breakfast of Paranthas, Chaas and Lassi.