Back to Southend and my growing up there. Before one got to 18/21, the only place to get into was TOTS (Talk of the South), which was a night club near to the infamous Southend seafront. Of course, as soon as you did reach the legal age it became the last place you wanted to get into, but once again, I digress.
Yesterday, we popped into TOTT, which stands for "Talk of the Town" and boldly advertised a happy hour(s) from 11:00 to 18:00. After we'd cleaned up from tramping around the shopping mall, we got there by 15:00, so we had plenty of time to get settled.
I'm not sure what I was expecting, perhaps a style of pub or bar, but instead we were invited inside, into a large sitting room, which was filled with stale smoke. Darkly lit and full of battered armchairs and sofas with low coffee tables near by, the place had real atmosphere and we loved it. The tables weren't the only things lacking height; the ceiling was also extremely low slung and it instantly reminded me of some kind of drinking den. Which it was.
Once again, wifey was the only chick in town but no one gave us much attention and we picked a quiet corner and ordered a 1.5 litre jug of draught Kingfisher at a fair INR 350 a pop- and with another to come for free later.
The menu was also extensive but we plumped for snacks and ended up with a platter of vegetable pakoras (think tempura style nibbles) and a dinner-plate sized papadum, which was loaded with a masala and was bloody fantastic. Both dishes were, but I got unlucky a few times by ending up with fresh chilli pakoras and they really made themselves known. I had to liberally dunk them in ketchup, which goes surprisingly well but we ate well and had a marvellous time there.
Yesterday, we popped into TOTT, which stands for "Talk of the Town" and boldly advertised a happy hour(s) from 11:00 to 18:00. After we'd cleaned up from tramping around the shopping mall, we got there by 15:00, so we had plenty of time to get settled.
I'm not sure what I was expecting, perhaps a style of pub or bar, but instead we were invited inside, into a large sitting room, which was filled with stale smoke. Darkly lit and full of battered armchairs and sofas with low coffee tables near by, the place had real atmosphere and we loved it. The tables weren't the only things lacking height; the ceiling was also extremely low slung and it instantly reminded me of some kind of drinking den. Which it was.
Once again, wifey was the only chick in town but no one gave us much attention and we picked a quiet corner and ordered a 1.5 litre jug of draught Kingfisher at a fair INR 350 a pop- and with another to come for free later.
The menu was also extensive but we plumped for snacks and ended up with a platter of vegetable pakoras (think tempura style nibbles) and a dinner-plate sized papadum, which was loaded with a masala and was bloody fantastic. Both dishes were, but I got unlucky a few times by ending up with fresh chilli pakoras and they really made themselves known. I had to liberally dunk them in ketchup, which goes surprisingly well but we ate well and had a marvellous time there.
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