At various times during my visits to Chauhan Ale and Masala House, I could have been in a gastropub, a steakhouse, a bistro, a sports bar, a local Indian joint or a tasting-menu restaurant. In the hands of chef and restaurateur Maneet Chauhan, Chauhan Ale and Masala House presents not so much an identity crisis as a lesson on the many meanings of "Indian fusion," two words that don't actually appear on the menu or website. With her team, Chauhan, who arrived in Nashville on clouds of praise for her Latin-Indian cooking at Vermilion in New York and Chicago, buttons up details on food, style and service.
That starts with the building's front door, which was moved from the corner of 12th to Grundy Street, changing the room's cavernous feel to one alive with intricate fixtures, video art and exotic finishes fully on display.
The cocktail list is madly inventive. Drinks like "Moni and the Mule" — a blend of gin, ginger-cayenne syrup, lemon, tamarind soda, lavender bitters and mint — are thrillingly close to going off the rails, but they never do. Balancing sensations is the underpinning of Indian cuisine, and this skill is on display with the Mitha Garam, an almost unthinkable blend of reposado tequila, ginger syrup, chile powder, ginger powder, mango pulp and thyme that rockets around the mouth's sweet, savory and hot receptors.
But there's plenty of good stuff in familiar-drink territory as well. A saffron cardamom double IPA, brewed for Chauhan by Cool Springs Brewery, manages to be both subtle and surprising. The "What Has Two Thums?" blends vanilla-chai spiced rum and India's Thums Up cola for a Cuba Libre from the subcontinent. For the Rye Humour, a server roasts a clove wrapped in orange peel over a coup of rye, Licor 43, orange bitters and Cardamaro for a quaff that nods at an Old Fashioned while leap-frogging over it.
What can possibly go with these tipples? A compact menu that also manages to sprawl across Indian "restaurant" food, Indian for the adventurous, and Indian-inflected American food.
The short bar and appetizer lists feel long because there's plenty that's tempting. Hot chicken pakoras are thickly coated with spices and fried crisp. They're already hot-hot without the ghost pepper dunk, but try it anyway — the back-of-the-mouth heat switches on each individual taste bud, so different from the cayenne lip-burn of Nashville hot chicken.
From India's rich tradition of street food comes kale pakora chaat, a mixture of kale chips, spicy garbanzos, tamarind, yogurt and mint that gets the nod from everyone who tries it. Though it's a bit fiddly for American fingers, I earnestly hope this dish stays on the menu.
Gol guppa shots are fun finger food. Puffy capsules of fried semolina dough are stuffed with spiced garbanzo and potato, a fan of watermelon radish perched atop like a topsy-turvy wizard hat. Drizzle in mint-cilantro water from the teeny carafe and send it down in one crazed bite.
As with the cocktails, there are enticing flavors among familiar European-style starters. The Vindaloo sausage appetizer pairs spicy hot meat with a cool lentil salad and a crisp, sour bit of pickled apple. Tellicherry-spiced grilled shrimp were approachable and nice to eat, but the cucumber-urad dal slaw alongside got the most attention. Urad dal, a hulled, split lentil, has a distinctive vegetal taste that seems like a strange choice, but the chemistry works.
I expect many Nashvillians will gladly meet this food where it is rather than waiting for it to come to them. But if you insist, there are plenty of more familiar flavors on the menu. Amritsari fish and masal aloo chips, for instance, and poutine. Both have outlines that are familiar enough, but at Chauhan the details are painted with an Indian palette. Fish and chips are served with luscious mango ketchup and spicy remoulade for dunking, while poutine, the ultimate drunk food, adds creamy, tomato-y makhani sauce to a mound of fries and mozzarella.
But suppose a person doesn't wish to be slapped upside the head with invention? Suppose that person just wants to order something familiar in shape and function? Behold, the Signature Preparations section, which is weighted toward U.S. "large plate" entrées with subtle Indian spicing. Cioppino, for instance, puts coconut garam masala broth in place of the usual broth. The flavor and texture are recognizable to anyone who's eaten seafood curries. Lamb shank in caramelized onion-almond sauce is delicious because it's lamb shank, and spicing is held to a whisper. The tomato rice side winks at osso buco's Italian heritage, while the papadum is a reminder of who's in the kitchen.
Rib-eye people will be comfortable with the Hyderabadi rib-eye, precisely cooked with glorious sear marks and a touch of moghul spice. Mashed potatoes and spinach sides are rich and creamy, with spicing that hints at sag aloo. The chili paneer burjee relleno is the kind of Indian fusion dish so well represented in Chauhan's cookbook Flavors of My World, which is for sale at the host desk. A mild pepper is stuffed with paneer, an Indian uncured cheese, and sauced with a yogurt kadhi for a satisfying meatless experience. (Full disclosure: I edited Chauhan's cookbook, though we never met. I was a contract editor, and we were separated by layers of editors and managers.)
Next to those dishes, the well-made and appetizing beet-cauliflower croquette, even with its crisp farina crust, seems tame. And in fact, the lively black-eyed pea and collard curry alongside steals the show. Where there are disappointments on the menu, it's because the kitchen sticks to the traditional Indian restaurant script. The "desi fare" and the daily meat-and-three tiffin boxes seem aimed at diners seeking typical Indian restaurant food — i.e., your favorite protein in your favorite sauce with a side of dal. Fish bhuna was less bold than expected, based on other menu high points. Lamb korma let me down with overcooked lamb that seemed to have been added to the sauce rather than cooked in it.
Melding the cookways of India's 900 million people and America's 300 million people is a monumental task. Chauhan seems to have generally nailed it, offering both the most thrilling flavors I've had in a while and Indian food that meets a variety of expectations. The fact that the food, drinks and space work so well speaks volumes about her skill in American tastes and Indian traditions, and the fine points of hospitality. Would that we all had such hands to work with.
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