Great news for Indian food lovers on Koh Phangan. A new hotspot of gastronomical proportions, Restaurant Aggata at Love Station Hostel in Ban Tai, has recently opened its doors on our lovely shores.
Aggata is serving up selected traditional Indian dishes at a chill and quiet atmosphere, secluded from the main road yet very easily accessible. Just follow the junction opposite Fabio’s (near the new 7/11) and right before the corner to Infinity.
Owned and managed by Zoran Trenchevski, a 32-year-old Macedonian who found his place in Koh Phangan and has been living here over 4 years now, Aggata’s true secret weapon is its chef, the author of all the flavours served with a genuine Nepali background, 27-year-old cook Vishna, who has been performing his talent in the kitchen in Thailand for the past 8 years.
Aggata Restaurant officially opened its doors on January 28th with an event opened to the public in which a buffet with free food tasting was offered, meant to introduce its customers to the high quality of food and service that Aggata was proud to present.
Zoran explains just how hard it was to open this small piece of delicious heaven.
“From the floor to the roof, literally, we rebuilt the whole area. Fortunately, we were able to do it in quite a short time with the help of our many talented friends.
Painting, sanding, decorating, more painting, landscaping… and we did all of this with very little technical knowledge but with a lot of creative skills and willingness to make it work out!”
But just how does Aggata food differ from other Asian cuisine?
“We bring to Koh Phangan traditional Indian food made with really fresh ingredients since the very beginning of the preparation of our dishes: selected herbs, spices, vegetables, meat and 100 percent handmade sauces that are the perfect combination for tasty and flavourful meals.
Aggata caters to all, not only the big fans of Indian cuisine, but also those who never tried it but are interested to do so.
From short-term tourists staying for just a few days who stop there for dinner after spending the whole day on the beach, to the long-term island stayers who get home tired after a day of work who can make a takeaway order or simply have it delivered to their place ordering through their partner Mamma Mia Wonderfood.
Now, some of you might think… just how spicy are the dishes?
“It is made accordingly to the customer’s taste: everything in our menu can be ordered extra spicy or not spicy at all and still keep the essence of the dish,” Zoran reassures.
And any Vegetarian/Vegan choices?
“We could say the menu is mainly vegetarian as we count with over 20 options of vegetarian food.”
With so many delicious options on the menu, just how can one decide what to get? Most importantly, what’s the favourite dish ordered at Aggata so far?
“That’s hard to tell, but we can try to separate into the vegetarian and non-vegetarian ones: Dothi Dahl and Palak Paneer are very famous for those who doesn’t eat meat while Butter Chicken and Chicken Tikka Masala are the chosen ones by meat lovers, definitely!
“Another big success around here are the naans we prepare in our very special traditional Tandoori oven at Aggata. You can choose it plain, with garlic, butter, or paneer (cheese).”
And how about some discounts for us people of Phangan?
“We often do some events to promote the restaurant.
For example, we’ve been running the 50 percent off event every Saturday for the past four months now: every Saturday we choose some popular items on the menu to give discounts to.
Just a few weeks ago we started the new promotion in which you get a free masala tea ordering a Kheer (homemade rice pudding)”.
This one is valid only for the morning shift at the restaurant (10am to 1pm) and was created with the purpose of encouraging customers to come and see our space in daylight while they enjoy a good chat among friends having a drink or a snack before starting their day or during their morning break.
“Our decoration, ambience music and garden stand out, and everything combined creates the experience we want our customers to have.
We provide quality meals which are available for takeaway and also delivery service together with our partner Mamma Mia Wonderfood.”
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