Khyber Pass, Oak Park

Khyber Pass, Oak Park

Khyber Pass is not a favorite Indian restaurant among Chicago food enthusiasts. It's been more or less ignored by cognoscenti of Indian cuisine: VI feels it serves food about as good as the boxed, pasteurized grub imported from the subcontinent, and I doubt that Zim has ever dignified the place with a passing comment in print.

We did the buffet (earlier, I ran a few miles, so I felt I deserved it - at least 2K calories, no prob).

-- Samosas. Pretty standard stuff, with potatoes and yellow lentils; it became much more interesting with thick red and very snappy tamarind sauce.

-- Ginger gorsht. The lamb chunks in some thin gravy was surprisingly tender and good. The seasoning was mild, just some herbs and bell pepper and tiny bit of ginger, which was fine because the lamb shone through. This, I suspect, did not start out with tender lamb; the chunks were probably from an older beast, and because they'd simmered all day, very tender and flavorful, and ha some character.

-- Lentil balls in yoghurt. This stuff was a lot like wet yellow bread, but in a good way. It didn't have a lot of taste, but it was cool and palate-cleansing, and it looked fine, messed up on my plate with the lamb.

-- OKRA. OKRA. OKRA. This was the standout. It felt fresh, not frozen, with none of the mush that comes from slow freezing. This was not the smooth skin okra we know in the US; the skin on this okra was armadillo-like, numbly, and so full of goodness in a relatively light sauce with onion and perhaps a little turmeric. No oleaginous mush; just firm and lush green taste, with an undercurrent of okranian pastiness. Though diced, it was clear the pieces were cut from a big long vegetable; I believe I've seen long okra like this at Thai Grocer, and it's very unlike the little torpedoes common in the American south. I would go back to Khyber Pass for this dish alone; it was that good (my guess, though, is that it may be available only occasionally).

-- Tandoori chicken. This stuff was a little strange with an unearthly red cast, even for tandoori chicken.

-- Mango ice. Nice dessert. Rich pumpkin yellow. Cake-like density. It was pretty much okay.

Overall, I judged it pretty much okay, and I slurped vast quantities with my fellow lestrygonians. Had two bottles of Flying Horse, an Indian lager; weak, but then again, I'm thinking maybe lighter brew is better with this kind of chow.


Khyber Pass
1031 Lake, Oak Park
Tel: 708-445-9032

Is okra a seasonal thing? Or is it a sub-continent thing? By chance, I had it yesterday -- it was part of the brunch at Sonargaon (spelling?), a Bangladesh restaurant. The okra dish was OK, but kind of bland. Nothing to write home about.

Sonargaon
2300 block of West Devon (Da bomb)
Chicago

I also love okra. Fried or with tomatoes/onions.

There is a famous roadhouse in Mississippi, where the signature 'yell' is 'Sorghum on a roll. How 'bout it?' The waitresses slather sorghum from a can onto wonderful baking powder biscuits.

The waitresses walk around with huge stainless steel bowls of all of their side dishes and you can eat until you burst. I almost did because of the fried okra.

We were there in 1990 on a roadtrip through Louisiana. I heard about it and we made sure to stop and we were not disappointed. The place had been in business for about 100 years.

Al,

You don't have to go so far to have the same experience. Though you will have to go far! We had a similar experience at the convergence of I-55 and I-57 in Sikeston, MO at Lambert's Cafe Home of Throwed Rolls.

They not only threw rolls at you from across the room, they had another person right behind with the sorghum or honey to slather on your rolls. Others roamed with various pots and kettles with fried okra; stewed tomatoes and macaroni; fried onions and potatoes; and black eyed peas.

Sure it was more circuses than breads, but we enjoyed all the same.

I've mentioned khyber pass before, I really dislike it, I think the packaged stuff is better.

on the okra front (which isn't so much a seasonal thing it's a subcontinental thing), I thought gaseeta khan's okra was pretty good.

Hey zim, great to hear from you.

I figured you'd probably dislike Khyber Pass -- it's kind of to Indian Food what Buco de Bebbi is to Italian Food. In no sense a destination restaurant -- more a convenience stop.

I'm going to try my hand at making some okra this weekend. I may do a subcontinental prep -- or maybe just fry the suckers.

David

David Hammond wrote:-- OKRA. OKRA. OKRA. This was the standout. It felt fresh, not frozen, with none of the mush that comes from slow freezing. This was not the smooth skin okra we know in the US; the skin on this okra was armadillo-like, numbly, and so full of goodness in a relatively light sauce with onion and perhaps a little turmeric. No oleaginous mush; just firm and lush green taste, with an undercurrent of okranian pastiness. Though diced, it was clear the pieces were cut from a big long vegetable; I believe I've seen long okra like this at Thai Grocer, and it's very unlike the little torpedoes common in the American south. I would go back to Khyber Pass for this dish alone; it was that good (my guess, though, is that it may be available only occasionally).]

Maybe okra is an Oak Park thing.

I had a marvelous dish of lamb with baby okra last fall at Grape Leaves, a Middle Eastern place there. The okra were about the size of my thumbnail. I'd never seen such tiny ones before.

Grape Leaves
129 S. Oak Park Ave., Oak Park
708/848-5555

Andy's Fruit Ranch in the 4700 block of N Kedzie sells tiny frozen okra from Egypt in bags. These are probably what LAZ had. They are so tender you can eat the calyx. We use them when we can't get good, fresh tender okra. I suspect that some of the other Middle Eastern stores in that neighborhood sell them, too. I just haven't looked in their freezer cases.

To my northern taste okra are at their best at 3-5 inches long and cooked whole. Cut the stem end off with your fork at the table. Mucilage is released from cut okra during cooking.

Okra pods develop extremely rapidly in hot weather. I have grown a dwarf variety in a container on the patio. It needed picking every other day in August. I haven't grown it again because one grower at the Lincoln Square farmers' market often has smaller okra picked the day before the market, and you can have too much of a good thing. The smaller the pods, the more freshness counts. Try farmers' markets in August and September for growers who harvest young. The difference from supermarket okra is almost as great as in sweet corn.

ekreider wrote:Andy's Fruit Ranch in the 4700 block of N Kedzie sells tiny frozen okra from Egypt in bags. These are probably what LAZ had. They are so tender you can eat the calyx.

It could be, but the texture was very good. I wouldn't have guessed they were frozen.

The texture of the little Egyptian frozen okra is great. We usually keep a bag in the freezer so a few can be pulled out to serve with other vegs. The key factor is short cooking--think like frozen peas.

Given the attention to okra, here's a primer from today's New York Times (registration required):

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/28/dining/28OKRA.html

A business associate who lives in Oak Park suggested this as a spot for us to meet next month for lunch. Any recent reports? I'm wondering what to expect.

Thanks,

=R=

Expect to wish you'd gone to Katy's down the street.

JUST KIDDING.

I've never been. If you go, please post about your experience. I have friends who go here every other Sunday like clockwork. They like it. They are from Kentucky.

seebee wrote:Expect to wish you'd gone to Katy's down the street.

JUST KIDDING.

I've never been. If you go, please post about your experience. I have friends who go here every other Sunday like clockwork. They like it. They are from Kentucky.

Hehe, I'm already feeling a bit that way but my companion is a nonagenarian who -- while a gamer -- has a tough time getting around. He suggested KP, which may have something to do with it being an easily accessible known quantity for him. If I go, I'll definitely update the thread and if we end up somewhere else, I'll report back on that, too.

For better or for worse, Khyber Pass has been around while - this thread is nearly 12 years old. At the very least, one could posit something favorable in regard to that.

=R=

KP was a regular haunt for me a dozen years ago. I've been back fitfully since, including one visit last year (2015). I think their breads are strong, and their grilled meats good for this stretch of Lake Street (until Nando's opened up across the way, which I think does a really good chicken thigh kebab), and their curries only average, especially off the buffet (which, admittedly, does come with lots of fresh bread and an unnecessarily sizzling tandoori platter, though there is some alchemy to lemon squeezed on scorched onions under leathery meat).

Most folks seem to do the buffet. I had a friend (whom we eventually nicknamed Mr. Makhani) who insisted on ordering a scratch full-price order of chicken makhani from the kitchen even when it was also on the buffet. They obliged him. The results were noticeably better.

I don't have current datapoints, but some less usual and reasonably tasty things they had were achari dishes with the very sour pickles cooked in with the proteins, a big and widely varied thali on traditional servingware which was at least pretty if not full-flavored, and a "quick" prawn biryani with eggs and paneer. In general, the biryani could be good, possibly something to order in advance, telling them you are a Devon regular. They used to have an order-ahead baby goat which I don't see on the current online menu. I'll be interested in your report.

Santander wrote:I don't have current datapoints, but some less usual and reasonably tasty things they had were achari dishes with the very sour pickles cooked in with the proteins, a big and widely varied thali on traditional servingware which was at least pretty if not full-flavored, and a "quick" prawn biryani with eggs and paneer. In general, the biryani could be good, possibly something to order in advance, telling them you are a Devon regular. They used to have an order-ahead baby goat which I don't see on the current online menu. I'll be interested in your report.

I actually did the order-ahead baby goat for a birthday a long while back - can't recall if it was for my 25th or 30th. I do recall that there were an absurd amount of leftovers even with a group of about 20.

Ronnie, Khyber Pass was my go-to for Indian food for years since I used to live about 4 blocks from there when they opened. I don't know if you remember meeting my wife, but she's northern Indian and lived there until she was about 14, and she gladly kept Khyber Pass in our regular rotation when she and I actually got married and moved in together. We used to do big family dinners with her family there 2-3 times a year before we moved out to Naperville. I would probably describe it as solid. I think for her it was satisfying, with a handful of dishes that reminded her of home.

You'll have better luck ordering off the menu than going with the buffet, though the buffet isn't bad. Just a notch or two below the freshly made stuff. Richa's usual order was lamb tikka masala (with a request to make it spicy) and their keema naan. She also ordered their gosht tikka any time she felt more like kebabs than a curry. Other dishes on occasion, but those 3 were staples for years.

I haven't been by in the past year or so, but I first started going there when they opened in '95 and never saw any quality dips in the 20 years I did stop in regularly, so I'd be surprised if anything has fallen off since my last visit. They were very consistent. It won't blow you away, but they're certainly worth a shot if your lunch companion wants to go. Just make sure to ask for your food to be made spicy. They will definitely default to neutral on nearly all dishes otherwise.

Since putting up the initial post, I've been back to Khyber Pass maybe 3-4 times, and it's most definitely consistent and still "pretty much okay." In Oak Park for lunch, you could do worse, and for an aged dining companion, it's low-key, low-light, just fine.

Thanks, everyone, for the information. I'll be sure to report back . . . though, I do foresee the buffet in my future.

=R=