Ali Khan Restaurant: Coin Prata!

Coin prata is a misnomer.  One can hardly find a coin that is the size of a doughnut!  But, somebody, somewhere must have coined (pun intended) the name and somehow it stuck and now we have coin prata.

If you never had coin prata before, what it is, is, a normal prata dough which is cut into three smaller pieces after it is stretched out, then extra margarine added and the dough is shaped into a circular puck.  This requires a little more effort but results in a really crispy and flavourful prata.  The set at Ali Khan comes with a very shiok mutton curry for $4.80.  4.5/5

Now, as you know, there are 24 hour Indian muslim eateries all over Singapore which serve prata, thosai, Indian rojak, mee goreng and the like.  These Indian eateries cater to many of the foreign workers who sometimes work till late at night and need something to eat.  A lot of places serve generic staples.  But once in a while, you do come across restaurants where the owner puts in the extra effort to serve good food.

For prata places, one tell tale sign is that they still make their own prata dough instead of buying the factory made ones.  You can often tell by looking at how they store the dough.  If it comes out of a cardboard box, it is likely to be factory made.  If it comes out of a plastic container, it is probably made in-house.  The other way to tell is to look around for sacks of “Ikan Terbang” flour.  This is the special flour made by Prima for roti prata and places that make their own dough will probably have sacks of it stacked somewhere!

Aside from the prata, my friend, EagleEye, who lives around the area tells me that the briyani and thosai there is pretty good too.  I had the fried chicken there which is very nice.  I found out from the workers there that they use fresh chicken, not frozen, which is delivered every morning.

Conclusion

The coin prata with mutton curry is one of those things that will surely hit the spot if you have a craving.  This is one of the few 24 hour places which still bothers to make their own prata dough which is a good indicator that the owner is still passionate about providing good food!

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