Food tasting at Body n Mind cafe, Saltlake (Kolkata)

Couple of weeks ago I was there at one of the ‘Healthy Café’ of Saltlake on invitation, named Body n Mind Café near the Swimming Pool area in an alley alongside the CCD (opposite Chowman). Should I term it a healthy café or a café for the health freaks, not really sure about that though! I have been to many such cafes for health conscious mass in India and abroad, and somehow I couldn’t relate this place with those. I am coming to the details in a minute. But yes, the intention and idea for setting this up is appreciable. When every other eatery is keen to earn fast cash by selling garbage there are few places who care about their patrons and clients.

Body n Mind café is surely one of them which is set up in a very homely environment inside a typical Saltlake residence where you have yoga, Zumba going on along with some gym equipments which I quickly spotted for some training. In this world of pollution and impure food products, keeping yourself healthy is very necessary by training your body, and mind of course by meditation and other means. And our food intake is surely a major part of it that determines how healthy we are from the core. So Dr. Sibidita, one of the directors of this place has taken an excellent move to set up this café that will take care of the food part, which I was talking about.

So, why was I upset in the beginning of this post? Let’s come to that point. All the few dishes which I had tried at this place were home-made by the team present there. They are fresh, no doubt about that and have measure calories and other nutrients in them, no arguing in that part. But I am seriously concerned about the quality and taste of the products being served. Healthy food is NOT a bitter medicine, it never should be, right? If so, then no one will be keen to take healthy food on a daily basis, everyone will go back to the junk crappy stuff. I was not very impressed by the taste of the food here which should definitely be looked into. I have had tastier healthy food elsewhere. I won’t drag this any further but I guess I have stated my point and let’s keep this precise.

The room on the right hand side at the end of the hall way is actually the café in this residential property that has wallpapers showing a pristine sea beach. There are pebbles placed in the corners of the rooms to make things bit more realistic in sync with the wallpapers. There are some tables placed in there with optimum seating arrangements, but yes I loved the two special cozy seating arrangements present there on the raised platform. And yes, the place was well lit and neat, no issues with that. Now let’s discuss a bit about the food which I had at this place.

I tried their Fresh watermelon juice, Smoothie, Baked Samosa, Chicken Kebab Roll, Paneer Kebab Roll, and Chicken Momo. I missed out on the Chicken steak and the couple of desserts which were served later, but I had to rush for another appointment by then. Also I had already tried enough food (when I left) to assess the quality of the food of a place, so I was good with that as well. Out of all these items I tried, I really loved the watermelon juice, which was extremely fresh and had no added sugar in it, it was very refreshing and something I was looking for as a welcome drink, but one point - it was served in a large glass with only one third of it filled with the juice, not sure why it was presented like that, if the volume which is being served is less (when compared to the volume of the glass) then a smaller glass should have been selected while serving the drink. But otherwise, the quality of the watermelon juice was bang on target, a bit thick, pure and fresh. The Smoothie was nice and was very thick in density, it was almost close to a semi solid mixture that had blended fruits in it including loads of bananas for sure. It was very healthy but bit too much for me since I am not very fond of blended bananas, in general. The Baked samosa was very innovative, and I liked the baked skin; though the filling was bit too dry and not very flavorful. A bit more modification of the filling can make this dish a super hit. It’s better to discuss least about the Chicken Momos since it resembled the momo I had prepared at my home (for the first time) five years back, I never though I will again get to taste such similar weird momos ever again in my life! The skin was very thick and hard as a rock at places (joints and folds) with a tight and dry filling. Loads of work needs to be done on this. Then I had a bite into the Chicken and Paneer kabab rolls, the skin was oil-free and perfect and the filling was nice, but again a bit dry.

Overall the quality of food didn’t impress me much to a great extent but the concept, thought and the initiative surely did. Hope they will strive harder in coming days and take the comments, feedback and criticisms in positive light. This initiative should keep moving on and Body n Mind should expand in the coming days outside Saltlake area, that should be the target.



Till then, I would suggest you to visit this place, try their juices, salads and steaks which I have learnt are really nice. Hope to try them all again sometime in near future.

Cheers!