Address: 6 Malvern Road, Powick, Worcester WR2 4QP

Telephone number: 01905 830 750

Website: www.cromwelklstandoori.co.uk (not working, under maintenance?)

Date of visit: 13 March 2010

Approximate cost per head for 2 courses: under £15 for starter, main plus rice

Comments on wine list/beer: cobra and a very cheap wine list

Summary:

Let’s get the wine out of the way. On the night we went, the place was full and most people were drinking cheap wine (£12 a bottle). I don’t think that spice and wine works together, so I never have wine with an “Indian” meal. Champagne just about works.

This is an interesting restaurant as it’s the first and only building on the way to Malvern as you enter Powick. The car park is often used by the Police (day time) for their mobile speed guns. This is one place that I would not recommend that you drink and drive as the car park is often also used by the police when they are having a break!

The place is called Cromwell for obvious historical reasons. The interesting fact is that this is the first “Asian” restaurant I have come across that does not use an “indianish” name. To make sure that the customers are not fooled, there is also a huge sign with the word “Indian” on it. But then, the people who operate its are Bangladeshis not Indians. They also do steak, scampi etc just in case you do not eat “spicy” food.

The menu has all the usual Indian restaurant favourites but it also has a section on fish and Bangladeshi dishes.

We ordered  chicken karahi and chicken chashi (on the menu, it said that it’s a Bangladeshi dish cooked in special sauce), pilaw rice, sag and bindi bajees.

The chicken dishes tasted quite nice but I am not sure of the “differences”. The bindi was chopped up finely and was excellent – in fact this is one of the best I have had for sometime.

All this was washed down with 3 pints of cobra and the total bill came to £33.

The fish dishes look very interesting and there were 2 fishes – roop and ayre – that I have never heard of. Must try it next time.

By the way, they are only open from 5.30 to 11.30. They do not serve lunch.

Eddie

Address: 23a St Mary’s Row, Moseley, Birmingham B13 8HW

Telephone number: 0121 442 22 22

Website: N/A

Date of visit: 17 December 2009

Approximate cost per head: £15

Comments on wine list/beer: Small wine list at lowish mark up, cobra on tap

Summary:
This is my daughter’s local – she and her friends eat here regularly so it should be good value for money.

The room looks like a converted warehouse with exposed brick works and wooden beams. This is another one of those places that has no table clothes but you get a decent napkin. It is otherwise pretty smart and they don’t do dosa or table naan. ( My daughter informed me that she has never come across table naan in Birmingham.)

The menu is quite extensive and it includes a whole page (inside cover) on what Deolali is or means –  sent to jail. You have to read the long version yourself if you go there.

The most interesting part of the menu are:

They offered food cooked in the tandoori oven but you can’t get plain tandoori chicken or mixed grill.

They offer a variety of seafood (not just prawns).

Coming back to the food, we had green masala salmon, chicken pathia with aloo gobi and sag on the side, pilau rice and a naan. The popadoms to start with were warm.

Lets start with the naan, it was thin and slightly crispy instead of the usual doughy version. Very nice. All the food came in rice bowls – mains and starters except the naan and popadoms. Now the interesting thing is that they charge £7.50 if you have the side dish as a main and £4 if it is on the side. So if you order it as a side dish, you will get as much as a main at significantly lower price.

All the main meat and fish courses are around £10 or over. The salmon was nice so was the chicken pathia. The sag was cooked and not wilted. Another interesting observation was that the dishes came with a toping of green onions instead of coriander.

The total bill including a bottle of pinot grigio and a pint of cobra came to £53.85 (service not included). I like the place but I think this place caters to non Indians rather than Indians. However, there was a table with 4 Indians  (male businessmen in suits). I have to go to Southhall and eat with the real McCoy to see what the real ethnic scene is all about.

Eddie

Location: 58 Headley Road, Woodley, Reading RG5 4JE

Web site: www.redrosewoodley.com

Telephone number: 01189440908

Date of visit: 26 October 2009

Approx. cost per head: £10 plus

Comments on wine list/beer: Stick to the beer – Kingfishere or Bangla

Review:

This is a neighbourhood Indian Restaurant that only gets busy during weekends. It does a roaring trade in takeaways and home delivery (free on orders over £15).

On the night we went, we had chicken tikka masala and the tandoori chicken with rice, nan and a couple of side dishes.

The tandoori was excellent and you get 4 legs when you order a whole chicken. I have always found this strange – a whole (or as they say “full”) chicken always comes with 4 legs and chicken tikka and the rest of the wet dishes are only “breast meat”. Have the Indians (or Bangladeshis)discovered genetic manipulation long before the rest of the world?

The nan bread was excellent and is one of the dish that you can only appreciate in a restaurant – they go rubbery when stored in a bag.

For side dishes, we had sag aloo and mushroom bajee which were fine.

I wasn’t entirely happy with the chicken tikka masala as it looked too red (unnatural) and tasted too sugary. I wish restaurants would stop using red dyes. Other than this, we had a nice meal. The service was good and apparently, this was rated as one of the top 100 Indian Restaurant (UK) a couple of years ago.

Parking is at the front of the restaurant. Its on the 63 and 65 bus route.

Eddie

The Light of Bengal started out who-knows how many years ago as a take-away and has done very well in Winchester, a city which is surprisingly poorly-served by high quality places to eat. A few years ago it opened a modest dining room which is well-frequented by devotees although not to the extent that one has to book. Last year I spent quite a bit of time in India. Returning home from that trip is the only time I’ve not craved to eat our national dish immediately on returning to these shores. But for every other return home, and many, many other meals, the Light of Bengal does the trick every time, serving splendid and authentic dishes—they have on a couple of occasions prepared food to order when my partner I and have ordered off the menu—to all those lucky enough to drop in for a take-away or to sit in the (far too) modest dining room and enjoy not only the wonderful food but also the very friendly service. I tend not to like “fancy” restaurants. This is my favourite place to eat in Winchester. (Damian Stafford, d@staffordnet.org.uk)