Food Friday: Dosa

Dosa 1700 Fillmore Street

Imagine this. You're sitting at home on a Saturday, watching a team you picked to get to the finals of March Madness completely toss things up by not winning. #3 seed, Florida State had just faced a crushing defeat to the 11th seed underdogs, Xavier. Needless to say, I was in need of some cheering up because my bracket was getting a bit busted. And what's a better way to quell the bracket blues than some good grub? Nothing, right? Luckily for me, I already had a reservation that evening to try out Dosa for the first time. Dosa had been on my list for years! (Remember when I did alphabet dining back in 2013? Dosa was my pick for our "D" restaurant, but we weren't able to make it!) That being said, I don't know why it took so long to get there - but better late than never!

We were invited to dine at Dosa to experience the restaurant's crowd favorites and a few dishes from their latest special menu offering - the limited-time Bengali menu. Owner and Executive Chef, Anjan Mitra worked with his mother to curate the best of Bengal, by combining home-cooked recipes with rich, fiery, and subtle flavors. The result is bite after bite of pure excellence. We started our meal with Dosa's own private label wines - a white, rosé, and red. Each wine was delicious and complimented different dishes, but my favorites were the rosé and red. The first dish that came out was the sprouted mung and paneer salad, which was tossed in an orange and cumin dressing. The salad (which paired incredibly with the white wine) was light, refreshing and had great texture thanks to the pomegranate seeds scattered throughout. Next up, was our first Bengali dish - the baiguni eggplant. The eggplant was fried in gram flour and came with a mint chutney dipping sauce. I loved this dish - the eggplant was deliciously wrapped in a crispy shell and was the perfect starter. Once we finished with our eggplant, we moved on to the lamb "shikampuri kebab" sliders, which had to be one of my top 3 favorites from the evening. The spicy lamb patties were filled with a dollop of cool yogurt, to help cut some of the spice, and sat on soft, sweet slider buns. The balance between all of the flavors in this one is incredibly - if you're not afraid of spice, this one is an absolute must. 

After the appetizers, we started to move into the mains. The first main was the mustard chile halibut, which was seasoned with red and green chile tumeric and lime, and sat on a bed of lemon rice. The halibut, which is also part of Dosa's Bengali menu is colorful as it is flavorful. I loved every bite of this light fish and enjoyed the hints of spice paired with the citrus undertones. Next, we had the hyderabadi lamb chops, made with spiced yogurt marinade and served with red pepper chutney and lemon rice. I'm a big fan of lamb and Dosa just does it right. From the slides to the chops, they get the flavors right. We couldn't leave Dosa without, well, a dosa, so we also had the white truffle masala dosa, which came with three different dipping sauces. 

You'd think that at this point we would have tapped out, but we couldn't leave without dessert. Another dish that made it to the top of my favorites was the mango tapioca - if you like tapioca and mango lassi, you will LOVE this. We also had earl grey ice cream, which was fantastic and just as flavorful as all of Dosa's savory plates. I can't express enough how delicious of a meal this was. I look forward to my next visit, where I'll likely dive into a few curry dishes and definitely order more sliders. 

The Bengali menu is only available until the end of the month, so do stop by if you're interested in any of special dishes called out above.