The Jhumar Lakeview Restaurant sits alongside Lake Udaipur in Udaipur, so basically it is what is says on the sign “a restaurant with a lakeside view.”

We stopped off here in the middle of a sight seeing tour around the city. It is another one of those places that the local tour guides have on their ‘list’ to take tourists too. On their website they say that “Jhumar, the Family Restaurant is a Multi Cuisine Restaurant serving Traditional Indian, Authentic, delicious, mouth watering Chinese and Continental all under one roof “.

Love this term ‘multi cuisine’ it feels like ‘multi-ball’ on a pin ball machine where you can fire balls randomly all over the worlds cuisines to see what else you could add to your menu. It basically means that if for some reason you don’t like Indian food you can get a random western type of meal as well. (note it often does not look or taste like you expect or hoped)

Starter Freebies

We were presented with some pretty interesting crispy poppadum complimentary starters which came with a really vibrant green mint and coriander dip. It was like a mixed bowl of crunchy crisps and talking one was a bit of a gamble. Some were really hot and fiery, some were plain, you could sort of tell which was which but it wasn’t that easy. If you picked out a spicy one you did find that a mouthful of soothing cold beer was needed to dampen down the light fire that was developing on your tongue. The dip was also a pretty good taste bud coolant too, it was very fresh and packed with clean coriander and mint flavours.

Aloo Matar

The Aloo Matar dish we chose at the Jhumar Lakeview Restaurant was a bit of a mistake as we were hoping for a drier dish without sauce to compliment our other choices of a mushroom curry. It was still pretty nice though, full of crunchy peas and soft potato in a runny brown curry gravy sauce. It was still early days with our menu navigation so we expected the odd duff dish. It was quite fresh looking and tasted good;  tomato, garlic and ginger being some of the major players in the bowl. There was plenty of cumin and chilli flavour notes to be found in the dish and a nice scattering of fresh coriander on top added a little freshness to the bite with each mouthful.

Pea and Mushroom Curry

The Mushroom curry at the Jhumar Lakeview Restaurant  was also packed full of those crunchy green garden peas and plenty of meaty mushroom too. The thick brown gravy sauce was a lot richer that expected, it was a bit creamy and perhaps not the best choice on a warm sunny day in the middle of a sightseeing tour. I did like it though but probably would not order it again just due to the overt richness of the sauce.

Garlic Butter Naan

The Garlic Naan was just as amazing as the other Indian breads that we have been eating on this trip. They just seem to be so much better than we get back home, or perhaps it is better to eat them with a nice lunch instead of after 5 pints of beer on curry mile in some generic UK city. Yep that is probably a factor. These naan’s though were particularly good, dripping with garlic butter, and covered with just enough blackened char to add a little bitterness to the bite.

The plate

Ok so we did mess up our selections a bit! When you put the dishes side by side on the plate well yes they do look quite similar! That is a shame though as both dishes on their own were very good. We just needed to have chosen something from the polar opposite end of the menu to compliment one of them. We live and learn though and move on to the next meal.

The Jhumar Lakeview Restaurant is a very pleasant place to sit for a while, take lunch and sup a cold beer. It is on the bank of the Fateh Sagar Lake which is manmade and you get good views of the islands from the garden of the restaurant where you can sit in the shade underneath their wide open canopies.

Location 5 Rani Road, Fateh Sagar Lake | Fateh Sagar Lake, Udaipur 313001, India

website: Jhumar Lakeview Restaurant