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Chau Marya in Gogol, Margao serves the intimate flavours of Goa鈥檚 home kitchens, like faw (poha), sheera (halwa), moong bhaji, and of course, chau (tea).
Costs we paid: teezan Rs 30, sheera Rs 40, mix bhaji Rs 45, ros omelette Rs 50, chicken cutlet pao Rs 100, moong bhaji Rs 30, chicken burger Rs 200
Chau Marya is located between Mascot pet shop and Asian Paints in Ferreira Garden on St Joachim Road (Sonsoddo road), near Chowgule College in Gogol, Margao. It鈥檚 between Bolshe Circle and the turnoff for Chowgule College from Gogol.
Timings: 7.30 am-12 pm, 4 pm-8 pm; Sundays CLOSED
To our surprise, we found that Chau Marya serves Goan's favourite comfort food, teezan (millet drink). A drink or porridge made of malted nachni (ragi/finger millet), teezan is a healthy, energy boosting drink which has been powering Goans through the day for ages. Even if you have just teezan and nothing else for breakfast, it鈥檚 enough.
We quickly order sheera, chau, bhaji pao and a big cup of teezan. The ros omelette also looks very tempting and we order that too.
The sheera is nice, with lots of ghee. The ros omelette is very good
Then, we had the teezan. Teezan is what your grandma made for your mother and what your mother made for you. When you鈥檙e ill, you鈥檙e given teezan. This is the most healthy breakfast one can have. Teezan they have mostly after delivery and after operation also. The wound heals faster. Even people going to gym have teezan. Not only does it fill you up, it gives you energy for a long time. And also, it鈥檚 delicious.
Delicious drinkable teezan is made with cow鈥檚 or coconut milk, and palm jaggery. The same combinations can be cooked till thick and set into a cold pudding. I love to have it as a pudding, preferably with some fresh mango on the side.
Nowadays, we get good malted nachni powder in Goan supermarkets, making teezan more easy to make. But at Chau Marya, they make it the old fashioned way, grinding the nachni themselves. You can never know what is inside a readymade powder, says Lui Estibeiro, owner of this cute cafe and, more importantly, a dad who is very particular about ensuring his children鈥檚 food is healthy.
And to find healthy food, he looks within his own Goan tradition and pulls out gems like teezan and mung bhaji and serves them up in his cafe.
Not only is Lui giving you healthy food to eat, he is taking you back to your roots. For that alone, we applaud Lui Estibeiro. And then we applaud him some more because what he serves is so tasty!
Just a few days later, I was back at Chau Marya for breakfast with my friend and Gogol resident, Viola. On this day, Viola enjoyed a nice, hot chicken cutlet pao and I had a hot and healthy moong bhaji with pao.
We had a lovely chat with Lui, who told us why he set up this cafe, and why he serves what he does. Lui is not a trained chef but a photographer. Running this cafe gives him a work-life balance that is better for him and his family, he says, without having to give up his passion for photography.
Apologies for the poor audio quality, due to intermittent rain.
Frankly, we are surprised to learn that he is not a professional chef, given how tasty the food is. We have tried his chicken burger (Rs 200) too. His wife even makes the burger buns for his chicken burgers.
We asked him how come he decided to serve such homely items like teezan and moong bhaji in his cafe. "Basically, if I can鈥檛 serve something to my kids from here, I don鈥檛 serve it here. Because I take food from here home for the kids," said Lui.
So now, if you want your kids to have a healthy, traditional Goan breakfast, you know where to come!
Hope you enjoy this 4K, hires video
Music:
Wanderer's Trove / A Nightingale's Journey / courtesy of www.epidemicsound.com
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