Seattle's Best Indian Food -- Bill Khanna Opens Chutney's On Queen Anne After Years Of Culinary Growth

Oct 1, 1995

John Hinterberger

ULTIMATELY, WHAT MAKES a restaurant special is its people.

When Chutney's - an attractive, artistic place - opened a few months ago on lower Queen Anne (519 First Ave. N.), it was apparent to even the casual visitor that this was a special Indian restaurant, staffed by some extraordinary people and run by a remarkable man.

Bill Khanna spent many years in a long and well-traveled career getting to Seattle, years of culinary growth that ranged from New Delhi to Victoria, B.C., from Salzberg, Austria, to Beverly Hills, from New York to Bellevue.

With his opening of Chutney's in Seattle this spring, he created the best Indian restaurant in the city, artfully decorated with hand-carved walnut bas-reliefs of Hindu religious figures and backed by a kitchen of equal artistry and fervor.

Seattle has had several Indian restaurants over the past three decades; some good, most adequate, a few disappointing. The Eastside had better luck, with Shamiana in Kirkland and Raga in Bellevue, both fine places.

Khanna was one of the founding partners in Raga, almost five years ago. When that partnership dissolved, he looked for a site near Seattle Center. When he found an old deli, a couple of blocks away from the Coliseum, he decided to bring in the exotic delights of New Delhi.

Khanna's career is instructive. It shows the kind of arduous professional progress that not many Americans choose to duplicate. He graduated with a three-year diploma in hotel management in Delhi, then received a degree in nutrition from Schloss Klesheim in Salzberg, finishing at the head of his class.

From there he immigrated to Canada, installed as the catering and convention manager at the Empress Hotel in Victoria. He later moved to Vancouver as the GM of Bridges on Granville Island. Next, he hooked up with one of the globe's more romantic restaurateurs, Sant Singh Chatwal, a Punjabi fighter pilot (by age 20) who founded the elegant and far-flung international Bombay Palace chain. (The best Indian dinner I ever encountered was at the Bombay Palace in London.)

Khanna supervised several of the Palaces - in Toronto, Vancouver, New York and Beverly Hills.

Thus, when he eventually conceived and crafted his own creation, there was literally a world of experience behind it.

Some very good restaurants are fine places in which to eat. Chutney's is that. More significantly, however, it is a special place to be.

In the course of many years of restaurant reviewing, I seldom revisit a restaurant once I have finished writing about it (there simply isn't time), until four or five years go by and it's time to review it again.

With Chutney's, I've gone back time and again, often for merely a bowl of fragrant basmati rice, a copper-clad pot of majestically simple dal (lentil and bean puree), some freshly baked nan, a couple of fresh chutneys and a cold glass of wine. Just to escape into another world - exotic, kind and gentle - for a contemplative, restorative hour.

As Khanna said, pointing to the 39 hand-engraved images hanging above: "With all those gods looking down, what can go wrong?"

Frankly, not much.

Indian dinners typically are served family style - and all at once - and are best enjoyed if you are part of a group. But with an eye toward Western preferences, Chutney's serves its dinners in at least three segments. You begin with a basket of crisp, wafer-thin papadum (lentil crackers) and two small bowls of chutney: a bright green mint-cilantro-jalapeno chutney and a brilliant red tomato-lemon-garlic dip.

Start with any of about a dozen appetizers ($2.75 to $4.50). The pakoras are superb: essentially, thinly battered fritters of either mixed vegetables or boneless chicken, made with chickpea flour. They are light, flavorful and not too filling. They, too, come with their own chutney: a dark, tart tamarind flavored with cardamom and cinnamon.

We finished off a plate of them with a couple of glasses of Paul Thomas' dry, cold Bartlett Pear wine, hardly authentic Indian, but an almost magical fit.

Other good choices: vegetable and/or meat samosas (stuffed turnovers), deep-fried calimari and curried mussels ($4.50), which are popular but I find somehow incongruous.

It's worth noting that many of these dishes can be quite buttery or oily in other Indian restaurants. Khanna has attempted to reduce oil and fat levels in all of his recipes to the barest minimums necessary to make the various braising and frying techniques workable. You will rarely note any visible oil or ghee (clarified butter used as a cooking medium for many Indian dishes) on any of his preparations.

If you want an interesting ethnic variation on American tavern chicken wings, try the Chili Chicken Wings ($3) which, instead of being deep fried, are marinated in spices and flash-roasted in a tandoor oven.

A choice starter is a quite delicate Mulligatawny Soup ($1.95), gracefully accented with lemon (and served with four more lemon wedges for additional tartness). Generally considered a quasi-colonial dish from the period of the Raj (it was very popular with the occupying British), the soup is genuinely Indian and its name derives from the Tamil word milagutannier, meaning "pepper water."

Incidentally, few of Chutney's items are searingly hot, although they can be ordered that way. Even the sometimes incendiary Vindaloo curries of lamb and/or chicken will arrive spicy and piquant, but not throat-threatening.

All entrees ($8.95 to 13.95) are accompanied by rice, lentils (dal) and raitas (yogurt side dishes with minced cucumber, spices and minced carrot).

The tandoori specialties are roasted in mesquite charcoal-fired clay ovens. The Bara Kabab ($12.95) is a generously portioned rack of lamb marinated in yogurt and spices and on my last visit was roasted to a perfect medium rare, the best I've ever had. It's served, fiata-fashion, on a sizzling platter atop steaming, crackling, partially browned onion rings. Served with it was an ornate vegetable biryani - basmati rice dotted through with diced carrot, zucchini, cauliflower, fresh fava beans and onion.

Another fine option is the Masala Stuffed Halibut Tandoori ($11.95), dusted with garam masala (dried, mixed spices), flash-roasted in the tandoor and sauced with a golden coverlet of minced apples, peppers, onions and mango.

Jeera Chicken Sagwala ($9.25) doesn't sound particularly ambrosial in its menu description ("Chicken cooked in a spiced cream spinach sauce in cumin") but it is a dark-green velvety delight, with chunks of tender breast meat perfectly cooked, still moist, in a sauce that is sheer botanical perfume.

Rogan Josh ($10.95) is a classic lamb curry, executed with a tomato-butter base with accents of fennel and curry spices. We'd ordered it spicy-hot, but it arrived more mellow than fiery; excellent and seductive, nevertheless.

For a vegetarian dinner (and there are an even dozen of them) try either the Began Bharta ($8.95) or the Bhindi Masala (also $8.95). The former is a roasted eggplant cooked with onions, tomatoes and spices; the latter is a similar dish made with tomatoes, peppers and marinated okra as the base vegetable.

A half-dozen authentic Indian desserts round out the menu. The Kheer ($3.50) is a simple but appealing rice pudding; the voluptuous house-made mango cheesecake ($3.50) destroys all sense of prudence.

The midday, all-you-can eat buffet, at $5.95 is a remarkable bargain.

Chutney's can be expected to be a landmark in Seattle ethnic dining for years to come.

# # # $$ Chutney's, 519 First Ave. N. Lunch ($5.95) 1:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. daily. Dinner ($9 to $14) 5 to 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday; until 10:30 p.m. Friday, Saturday. Lounge, full bar. Major credit cards. No smoking. Reservations: 284-6799. ----------------------------------------------------------------- John Hinterberger, who writes the weekly restaurant review in Tempo and a Sunday food column in Pacific Magazine, visits restaurants anonymously and unannounced. He pays in full for all food, wines and services. Interviews of the restaurants' management and staff are done only after meals and services have been appraised. He does not accept invitations to evaluate restaurants. Betty Udesen is a Times photographer.