Preeti's Kitchen offers homemade Indian food
For fans of Indian food, Champaign-Urbana is lucky to have a quality establishment like Bombay Indian Grill in our midst. Like most Indian restaurants in the States, Bombay Indian Grill serves mostly Northern Indian cuisine. For more variety, we often have to drive to Bloomington where we can choose from a wider selection at India Bhavan. Every now and then, we even venture to Chicago's Little India, which is almost like going to Mumbai. But regardless of where you go to get your Indian food fix, you'll still be eating restaurant food. Now there's nothing wrong with quality restaurant food. But once you've tasted homemade Indian food, you'll never want to go back. Just like your fondest memories of what mother used to cook, homemade Indian food brings comfort to the heart, potent flavors for the palette, and amazing colors for the eye.
So if your mom's not Indian, how does one get homemade Indian food? Well, on a recent visit to Annapoorna, our local Indian grocery store, we saw a flyer hanging on the wall for Preeti's Kitchen. The flyer promised homemade Indian meals for take-out at a reasonable price, so I wrote down her phone number and promptly filed it away. One evening, we were thinking of going out for Indian food again and I remembered we still had Preeti's phone number on file. Preeti also has a web site at www.preetiskitchen.com (complete with detailed menu descriptions), but we decided to call her to ask for her personal recommendations. Preeti helped us narrow down our choices to four dishes and told us our order would be ready the next day.
Since Preeti doesn't take credit cards or checks, we had to bring cash to pay for our order. Following the instructions on her web site, we drove to her house in Savoy and picked up our order. Unlike Chinese take-out which is hot and ready to eat, we had to re-heat Preeti's dishes, which is just as well, since the food probably would have been luke-warm by the time we got home anyway. The extra few minutes it took to warm up dinner was well worth it as the aromas of the spices filled the air. We anxiously sat down and dug in to what may be the tastiest Indian meal we've every had.
Our favorite dish was Preeti's Chicken Masala, a spicy curry dish with a potent sauce. We also thoroughly enjoyed her Stuffed Capsicum (bell peppers) filled with well-seasoned potatoes and served in another very potent sauce. By far the most interesting dish was the Vetha kohzyambu, a deep red chili "soup" laced with pearl onions, garlic, and other exotic ingredients. This dish went perfectly with Preeti's Chinese-style Fried Rice, which nicely complemented the other entrees. We were also very glad to have some Tandoori Naan from Meijer on hand, because the heat of the spices definitely took its toll. These are not dishes for the faint of heart, but we were very satisfied with our meal and there was plenty of food left over for the next day.
What made this meal memorable was not just the flavors and the aromas, but the fact we can actually taste the love and care she put into every dish. We have a feeling we'll be calling Preeti again in the near future for more of her amazing creations.
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The Alan Partridge lookalike on the right in the first small photo has nothing to condescend to anyone about. AH HA!
Snell and the little Hitlers of the neighborhood association need to chill out. Legitimate businesses should have the freedom to exist without having to endure the slings and arrows of ignorant and misguided opposition.
represent, Matt.
Yeah, I’d agree that Transporter Room 3 is the worst house venue I’ve ever seen.
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Not so much far-right Tea Party as a balanced, moderate viewpoint between letting businesses succeed and protecting society with reasonable regulations. In spite of what the city reps are saying, the interpretation of policy on this issue certainly has changed. Letting a business start up under one…
I think it’s neat that SP has turned rightward, now espousing a Tea Party-style frustration with government regulations & taxes.
This makes me so sad. (Happy to live in Urbana, though!) Crave Truck has been a GREAT addition to the food choices in C-U, and it’d be a travesty to chase them away. This town should be supporting small businesses. I’m glad to hear that they’ll still…
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What? Echo! (Echo!) Where’s the dischord and dissent?
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And without bloodshed. Sounds like the Savoy trustees aren’t as narrow-minded as some of their whiny pants constituents. Do you think quack Snell is already planning an asinine counterattack or is he still laying low after those “threats” against his person?
hey, if hair ain’t gon’ be over your head, my jokes may as well be.
Okay, almost 24 hours later and I finally got Issac’s Summer joke. I’m an idiot.
Excellent. I am glad sometimes American dreams are encouraged, rather than stifled.
Swap the dog for a fire pit and it sounds like you’re writing about my back yard. Very nice.
funny, as your summer begins, another Summer ends.
@Dan - Wow. Unfortunately, I have to refrain from further comment due to a previous employment relationship. But with that brief context you might be able to imagine possible comments or responses I could have.
Oh, by the way, the “Champaign County YMCA” no longer exists. The official name is now the “Stephens Family YMCA” (the website has not been updated, but check out the latest program guide). And no, it’s not just the name of the building. It’s the name of the organization.
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Food trucks are the start-up, small businesses of the future for those unable to afford real estate. No surprise, that merchants who pay rent, utilities, and maintenance on a property would despise the traveling competition. Or developers who build more empty retail spaces would want to close…