Billing for your restaurant in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands
The fish plate's rate of the morning, the second round at the table and the regular's tab, all on the phone.
A fish plate priced by the morning's catch and a board that is already wrong
A pot started an hour before the ferry docks
The curry in coconut milk with tamarind takes time, so the pot is started before the rush. How much to cook is a guess of how many plates the ferry will bring, and a wrong guess is a late plate or a pot of curry that is still there at night.
A ferry docks and the whole room fills at once
When a ferry docks a crowd arrives together, and an hour later the room is empty. The kitchen cooks for a rush that comes with the boat, and the bills of that hour are written fast, with the second round for one table added to the wrong slip. A waiter who adds a round to the wrong slip is a waiter who is apologising to a table that is already hungry.
The rice sack that runs low on the wrong day
Rice, oil and tea come by ship like everything else, and a sack that runs low on a ferry day is a plate you cannot make. You find out by looking in the bin when a table has ordered, and the table has to be told. The table ordered, the kitchen cannot make it, and the only thing left to do is apologise.
Tools for a kitchen that cooks rice and fish curry all day
Bills on your phone
The second helping of rice and the tea at the end of the meal are added to the same table's bill, and the total is ready when the diner stands up.
Daily reports
At night the day's rice and fish curry plates counted, so the next boat's fish order is a number.
Low stock warnings
The fish plate empties the rice sack fastest. The warning shows the sack low the day before a ferry.
Where the harbours meet the dining room
A restaurant here stands near the water, and so does the road that feeds it.
- Port Blair has the Haddo, Wharf and Chatham harbours for ships to the mainland, about 1,190 km from Chennai and 1,255 km from Kolkata. The rice, the oil and the tea in your kitchen may have crossed that sea.
- Trade in copra, dried coconut kernel, has long been the mainstay of the Nicobar islands, which depended almost entirely on copra exports for outside goods (2010 report). A restaurant that cooks with coconut milk is on familiar ground there.
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From the first plate of the lunch hour to the regular's tab
A ferry day's pot and a rough-weather day's pot are two pots
The plates that go on a day the ferry docks are not the plates that go on a day the weather keeps the boat away. Read the two kinds of day apart, and the first pot is made to the kind of day it is, with a little more when the rate has changed.
The cash box is counted against the hour's bills
When the room empties after a ferry, the hour's bills are one list on the phone. The cash box is counted against that list, so the waiter who added the second round for table four is not blamed for a short count that was only a slip written fast.
The waiter stops guessing when the room will empty
After a ferry day the report shows how many plates went in the hour after the boat. The waiter, who used to guess when the room would empty, now knows when the rush is over, and clears and lays the tables before the next boat.
Questions Andaman restaurant owners ask
The fish did not come on the ferry today. What do I do about the fish plate?
When the next boat brings fish, note the kilos on the supplier's page. Until they are noted the fish plate stays off the day's bills, and from then it is back on the list.
A traveller wants the fish plate boxed before the ferry leaves. Can the bill reach him at once?
Yes. Bill the boxed plate while it is being packed and send the bill to his WhatsApp. He walks to the jetty with it, and nobody waits at the counter for a sum.
A guest asks for the fish plate with less rice. Is that a new item?
Not always. If it is asked for once in a while, bill the full fish plate at a changed rate on that one bill. Make it an item only when the lighter plate is asked for often.
The year of the most visitors and a plate of rice and fish curry
In August 2025 the Lieutenant Governor said the islands had their highest-ever tourist footfall that year, with domestic visitors up 41 per cent and foreign arrivals up 27 per cent over 2024. More visitors mean more tables to fill and more bills to write in the same hours.
Rice and fish curry, cooked in coconut milk with tamarind and spices, is the staple diet of many locals in the Andamans. It is the plate many local customers order without looking at the menu, so it is worth having on the phone with a rate of its own.