A night at Park Plaza, Bengaluru

I love travelling. All the excitement in planning, packing, boarding a train/flight, visiting new places, meeting new people, shopping etc etc are things I totally look forward to.

So when I had to attend a cousin's wedding at Bengaluru, I couldn't help but extend my stay, specially with my anniversary nearby.

Once the wedding ceremonies & craziness got over, I could hardly wait to check into a hotel to relax, the thing I mainly took this vacation for.

We decided to stay in 2 different hotels both nights, since we couldn't decide between the two. Park Plaza is a business hotel situated at the main highway at Marathalli, near Whitefield, and is in proximity to the business centers and big offices. It may look solemn from far off, but once you enter, its a beautiful structure, surrounded by lush greenery everywhere. The entrance has a waterfall instalation which looks totally grand.

We had a hassle free check-in, got fresh in our room (I'll talk about the room later) and went to Shao, their in house Chinese restaurant for lunch. They have a total of 5 F&B outlets in house, which is quite extensive for a business hotel. They also keep having a lot of promotions and food festivals, for eg. They had 'tale of 2 cities' going on at Saffron.

At Shao, we started off with some chicken egg-drop soup, golden fried baby-corn, Chinese cream dumplings, vegetable wrapped dumplings, stir fried vegetables with water-chestnut, Hainan chicken, shredded chicken along with jasmine rice. We also had virgin mojito's and beer along with this and ended it with date pancakes with homemade vanilla ice-cream for dessert. Everything had the perfect flavours, which we could savour with each bite. And there was a coconut palette cleanser after the appetisers that made us relish the main course even more. It were these small things that lead to perfection - like the clear noodles in the soup or how the wrapped dumplings are so crisp.

We ate at leisure, something I have almost forgotten how to, thanks to the lil one, but their crew happily offered to babysit my boy till we got done with lunch.

We also had the privilege to meet the prestigious Executive Chef Narendra Singh, who comes with an impressive experience history and had quite his share of stories for us. We could have gone on talking till night had we not had to go out.

We went out for the evening, to meet my cousin who lives in Bengaluru, and were back for dinner after a tiresome to and from in the traffic. I thought I'll quickly grab a bite and head to the room. But the team at Saffron, their in house Indian restaurant, changed my mind.

They laid out a feast in front of us starting from drinks - a Tropical punch mocktail and beer for the husband, a veg and non-veg platter that had brocolli, paneer, roasted achaari pineapple, etc. The highlight for us were the pineapple, and this anardana chutney they served. Totally amazing! For main course we had Ma di daal, sarso da saag, kulchas and rice as far as veg was concerned, and chicken tikka, chicken ghosth etc in non-veg. I didn't find the paneer exceptional, but the dal and sarso da saag were too good.

I thought I could never ever eat again. We ended with some mouth freshener and headed back to the room. The room, as well as the hotel, is all made using state of the art technology and had an extremely professional touch to it. There even were toiletries like lip balm and so, to add to the regulars. We all slept like a baby that night.

Next morning we headed to Melange, their 24*7 cafe that caters to buffet meals. The variety was magnificent there was so much offered on the buffet that for any true foodie it would be a difficult time to choose what to go for.

I went for the pancakes, mashed potatoes, masala cheese omelette, fresh pineapple juice, toasted bread with baked beans, cinnamon donut and a chocolate muffin. The husband went for the Indian spread i.e. poori-sabji, idli sambhar chutney, etc.

We interacted with Prapti from their team throughout our stay, and she was such a warm person and we talked like we knew each other since ages.

Their bell desk and entrance, and reception were on different floors, and this is the first time I've seen something like that. And the lobby and Lounging area at the reception is huge and grandeur. It all had a very elite and royal feel to it.

Check out again was a hassle free procedure and we can't wait to be back here! If you're heading to Bangalore this Christmas and New Year's, then do check out their latest offerings and offers. Don't forget to follow them on Facebook & Twitter!

P.C. @ieatsleeprave and @koshik_sash Taken with the iPhone 6S