Manek Chowk: The Mecca of street food

Ahmedabad is a Street food lovers delight! The city has variety of street food to offer in the day and night as well. If one is visiting Ahmedabad and does not taste the Street Food at the Manek Chowk, the visit cannot be considered complete.

Manek Chowk is an open square situated at the heart of old Ahmedabad. The Market has three shades. It is a vegetable market in the mornings and in the day time they sell jewels, but at the night time you will see people swarming in to order and savor the street food delicacies. Slurpicious, I must say. From late night to early morning, this place is perfect place to satisfy one’s midnight cravings!

Manek Chowk is named after Baba Maneknath. The history of Manek baug goes like this – King Ahmed Shah was voyaging and he recognized appropriate place for the development of another city. King's men would work amid the day for constructing a wall in one of the areas of the city. The wall kept on developing cracks. Badshah then looked for Baba Maneknaths advice; he told the king to begin the development in an alternate area as the present area was not auspicious. Manek Burage is the place from where the development of this city then again began. 

The king chose to commit a vital street intersection in his memory for the general population of this city — the name of the intersection was called "Manek chowk." On each Vijayadashmi the relatives (at present the twelfth era) of Baba Maneknath raise a banner in his memory. The size of this place is superb, there is a middle square (chowk) and the encompassing structures give a feeling of fencing in the area. Too many narrow rods intersecting gives an otherworldly character to the place. The closed shutters of the shops give enough space for the food stalls and storage.

This place serves variety of delicacies including the regulars like Pani Puri, chat, sweets, snacks, along with some extremely innovative things. This place is a perfect example for creative “food lab”. One can get the never hear combination of ingredients. Where else in the city one would get Ice cream sandwich, chocolate sandwich or pineapple sandwich (with real pineapple not jam) or a chocolate pizza.  Imagine a pizza having chocolate gravy in place of tomato gravy and topped with cheese. Also try out the specialties; Manek’s Ghughra sandwich ice cream sandwiches and Balam dosas with a dollop of coconut chutney and spicy sambhar.

This place casts a spell at night and the even health freaks let loose and indulge in some extra kilocalories amidst the open sky and the entire hustle bustle.  Manekchowk has always been a popular tourist destination and all the amdavadis have at least once visited this high voltage food presentation. This place is a complete gastronomic delight and is something one should surely experience.  Having said all that, I would still recommend that one must try such food items at least once.