Venue: PSOI, Nehru Park
Date: 27- 29 November 2015
Official website

The Kumbh Mela of food festivals – New Delhi Palate Fest was organised at – no prize for guessing – PSOI Cub, Nehru Park, Chanakyapuri. PSOI has become a go-to place for food festivals in Delhi. We attended Zaika-e-Delhi  at this venue just last month. But we found the New Delhi Palate Fest to be way bigger and grander. In fact, the recently concluded Grub Fest  fell short in size.

This food festival had brought the surrounding area at a standstill with hundreds of cars parked on the adjoining roads and several waiting to find some slot to park. Delhi Traffic Police was going bonkers to manage such a volley of cars – all there to attend the festival.

We parked almost a kilometer away from one of the entrances. The crowd and the madness we saw here was unparallel. Once inside, we saw all sorts of stalls some in tents and some on thelas (carts).

The smoke from kebabs being roasted live filled the air with the aroma of Mughlai food. It also gave the area a surreal look. There was sitting arrangement at some of the stalls but this was not sufficient for the huge crowd. However, the visitors didn’t seem to mind standing and eating.

Delhi’s who’s who in terms of restaurants and eateries had their stalls at the Palate Fest. Some were known names and some seemed to be new startups. Many bakery stalls with mouth watering cakes and savouries spoilt people for choice. It was difficult to decide what to eat and what to leave. A few stalls were also selling packaged items like organic tea etc.

To engage kids and kids at heart, they had a huge chair made of balloons installed in an open field. This was a hit among the click-loving visitors.

The food and music connect is a newly founded relationship what with TV shows combining cooking with music bands on “Live Foods” channel etc.

This fest also had a huge stage with blaring lights where the  DJ was playing ear drum banging, feet pulsating music.

Teenagers were dancing and clicking selfies in the open dance area. Celebrity chefs such as Kunal Kapoor, Vicky Ratnani etc. held sessions throughout the evening.

The festival brought a lot of food businesses under one roof for sure, but as a visitor, there was very little that was not seen or experienced before. All said and done, one can credit the organizers for the grandeur of this event and to make it look very festive as well. From the sheer volume of the number of people and exhibitors one can easily make out that the love of food among Delhiites is undying and we are sure Delhi’s title of food capital is going to remain unchallenged forever.