Smoking hot!

By Sherwani Synon

There’s nothing like the aroma of a smoking hot dish to get your stomach rumbling and most Sri Lankans prefer their food hot and spicy; in fact we may just be genetically geared to yearn for food laced with spice.
 

Couple these two elements and the end result is sizzling food; a Japanese concept owner and founder of ‘The Sizzle’ Tushar Amalen experienced while studying in Mumbai and has shared back home.
 

 Located on Walukarama road Colombo 3, ‘The Sizzle’ concept took Colombo by surprise and gained immense popularity among diners. 
 

Tracing back his journey in dining, Amalen said, “As soon as I tasted sizzling Indian food, I fell in love with it. After I completed my studies, I returned to Sri Lanka and started up my own business. While doing this, I thought of setting up my own restaurant and I knew what kind of food I wanted to serve.”
 

As Amalen wanted his customers to enjoy the exact experience, he brought down two chefs from the same kitchen that had prepared his first sizzling meal to his restaurant.
 

In addition to the variety of sizzling dishes, Amalen has also come up with a new concept called the ‘smelting pot’ where the diner is served a sizzling bowl of sauce and a platter filled with preferred meat cubes, baby corn, mushrooms and croutons.
 

While I enjoyed my drink, a bowl of sauce accompanied by a small burner and a platter arrived at the table.
 

“The idea behind this is, the diner is given a variety of food items such as meat cubes, baby corn and mushrooms with a bowl of sizzling sauce. And then you simply dip the items into this sauce and devour,” he explained.
 

So I got the skewer ready with a cube of lamb and I plunged it into the bowl of sauce. My initial reaction was surprise as the sauce and lamb flavors hit my palette. The sauce was definitely a hit, thick and warm, cheesy and mildly spiced to compliment the lamb. 
 

Although Amalen refused to reveal the ingredients that went into the sauce, he did mention cheese and that a lot of hard work has gone into the making of the sauce.
 

The restaurant also offers an array of chicken, beef, mutton vegetarian and kid’s dishes and the Seafood dishes include squid, prawns, modha and lobsters.
 

“Our Mongolian and biryani menus are very popular during lunch hours. We have some of the best beef steaks and lamb chops and we have a lot of Muslim clientele who come to sizzle specially for the steaks as they can’t have Halal beef steaks in most places,” he said.
 

Apart from the sizzling steaks at the restaurant, the sizzling desserts have also developed a fan base in Colombo. From cheesecakes, brownies to chocolate biscuit puddings, every dessert in the menu is served in a sizzling hot plate. I selected Teresa’s favorite sizzle, a sizzling blueberry Philadelphia cream cheese cake and vanilla ice cream dressed in almond sauce and blueberry sauce.
 

The cheesecake was delicious. The contrasting blends of vanilla ice cream and sizzling blueberry sauce on the cheesecake scored 9 points with my palette. An afternoon which started off with sizzling dishes and smelting pots ended with a sizzling and delicious dessert. A perfect end to a sizzling day!