Celebrated the Valentine’s Day at one of the unique Veg Restaurant in the heart of Green Glen Layout called MAIA.  The place is special as all the dishes in the menu are Mothers Recipes.  The brain-child and mastermind behind this restaurant are Sejal Shah and Ishan Shah.  Infact, most of the dishes in the menu are Sejal’s own recipes.  I got an opportunity to talk to both and was impressed with their energy & enthusiasm.

Valentine’s Day Meal

For this Valentine Day, they came up with a special 5 course meal including – Soups, Salads, Starters, Mains & Desserts.  And in each of courses, there were 3-5 items served which are picked from the menu.

Soups – There were 2 varieties of soup including Beetroot & Walnut Soup, Roasted Pumpkin Soup. Both the soup were thick and tasty, it was hard to choose the better one.

Starters – Aromatic Kebabs, Mozzarella Melt Cigarillas, Mushroom Crostini were served.  Every starter seemed to taste better than the other.  But I personally loved the Mushroom Crostini and Cigarillas.

Main Course – Among the available main course, I could only try the Bharwan Aloo Pyaaz served with Theplas.  The taste of the Bharwan Aloo was very good, and I very much enjoyed it along with the Theplas.  There were other options like Pasta (Penne & buttered broccoli in a pink sauce), Khao Suey and Paneer Makhani that I could not try.  Hoping to do so the next time I visit MAIA.

Desserts – Tasted the Salted Caramel with Cookie crumble and Sooji Halwa Heartlets.  Both the desserts were made and presented well.  I personally loved the Cookie crumble because of the salted caramel.

Popcorn milkshake, another signature drink that anyone visiting this place should be trying.  The taste of the drink comes from the milk, chocolate, probably some vanilla ice-cream and pop-corn.  We can make out the pop-corn taste but hard to guess the blending process.  The recipe for making this milkshake is not known, otherwise I would love to try making it at home.

Ambiance

This one of the main highlights of restaurant.  I would not mind clicking picture at every nook and corner.

• The places look huge and first guess was that it looked like pub.
• Many of the lamp-shades and artist items are specially imported from Bangkok.
  

  

  

  

  
• Few other things to highlight – Special Community table made of concrete, Special paintings of Celebrities, Paintings of cycle which has a 3D effect, Paintings of bird sitting on branches, Tables with age old ages, Feeding Room for babies, Water body, Special artwork with Feng Shui symbol & message and many more things.
  

  

  
• Traditional games like Daadima are present on the table-top which can keep the guests engaged while waiting for the food.
• They plan to allow mothers to have cooking classes to show-case some of their recipes to outsiders.
  

The restaurant has good space on the 1^st level where corporate meetings, team meeting/lunch, small parties can be held.  IT Professionals can use it to host workshops.

Overall Experience

I personally had a great time visiting the place and trying out some of the wonderful food.  The place located between many apartments, making it cosy and calm.  Anyone visiting this place will surely get a delightful experience.

This place can be used for hanging out with friends and have a special dining experience with family & relatives.  I also hear that they plant to setup a section where some of the curated Mothers prepared items can be put up for sale apart from the teaching classes.

I feel that this will become one of the very popular eat-out places in Bangalore.  Looking forward to visiting them soon.

My rating for the current experience would be 4.0/5.
Rating in other departments.
Food – 4.0/5
Drinks – 4.0/5
Service – 3.75/5
Ambiance – 4.25/5
Food for 2 at this restaurant will come upto anywhere between INR 1200-1500.