best indian food in london

we've done this like 10 times before surely? </alba>

that one in tooting i can't remember the name of
tayyabs in whitechapel
standard balti on brick lane
those ones in southall that ed's always banging on about

there you go, lock thread.

oh and the ones on drummond street for dhosa

apologies, I'm normally judicious about using the search function but am at work and was posting out loud : (

arguably chor bizarre on albemarle street - http://www.chorbizarrerestaurant.com/newsite/index.html

"A Chor Bizarre," by Prince.

bear in mind Tayyabs is closed until 13th October due to Ramadan, sez their website

I liked Mirch Masala when we tried there - they have one in Tooting as well as Limehouse, Southall, Norbury.

i have been to tayyab's and it is fucking awesome

it won't change your life.

and it's amazingly full.

It's good, definitely.

nrq, how much can you possibly hate fun not to enjoy a meal at tayyabs? if only for the lamb chops and tikka fish and the sheek kebab?

i've never been turned away or even had to wait for a table, so hardly "amazingly full"...

steve i think "the one in tooting" i'm refering to above is the mirch masala, thank you :)

tandoori express on deptford high st
cinnamon just off lewisham way
monsoon on new cross rd
2 sisters in nunhead

destroy brick lane

apart from bagels

I'm a big fan of Tayyabs as well. My favourite is Kastouri down in tooting, dishes I've never seen anywhere else and the incomparable taste bomb puris.

can anybody recommend a great place to get dosas and chat?

ooh, r1o natsume appears to live down my neck of the woods. still waiting for matt dc to run the rule over blackheath/lee green, though...

For Dosas and Chat go to Drummond street for either Chutney's or the Ravi shankar.

there's a fanbloodytastic south indian place on willesden lane...

um

i've forgotten its name

aha!

http://www.vijayindia.com/

(it's a shitty website but don't let that deter you)

other place for dosas and Chat = Ealing Road in Wembley, down the bottom end not far from Alperon

drummond street is good. tooting is good. the one on eversholt road is good. brick lane is okay and fun with a big group.

brick lane = where they're always yelling at you, right?

like, what, 7th St. in Manhattan or Devon in Chicago, or whatever

Best place on Drummond St = Diwana Bhel Poori.

i have never had a bad curry on brick lane, but i've never had a memorably outstanding one either, and by christ the curry pimps are irritating!

(that said, it's funny walking down brick lane as the only chap in a big group of girls - the curry pimps all zoom in on the one fellaand make you feel like The Fuckin' Don for like three seconds)

Why is The Curry Pimps not a band name yet?

brick lane reminds me of walking through benidorm with everyone trying to drag you into their restaurant, and it really gets on my tits, so I never go down there, and don't feel I'm missing out either, Tayyabs and the Lahore sort me out in that area. The former public toilet was pretty good too, but a coach took that out last year, never to return apparently.

I went to one in Southall a couple of years back, which was fantastic and stunningly cheap. I wish I could remember the name - past the cinema over the bridge on the right - it had a beyond-ordinary name like Standard Indian or something.

My two favourites back then were the Lahore Kebab House in Whitechapel and the Rasa in Stoke Newington. The former got a mention in OFM (was it OFM?) at the weekend, but I don't know if that means much, seeing as they totally missed a couple of obvious great ones in Glasgow.

Carsmile, Mirch Masala was the one on Commercial Road we went to when me and Neil were down in April, where Sarah had a meatshake and we all forgot to BOOB (that's Bring Our Own Bottles, btw)

I've been up the brick lane and agree with porkpie but it was very cheap

Oh yes, and Farhana Tandoori on Turnpike Lane is absurdly cheap - they've spent nothing on decor - but very very good, with an open kitchen so you can watch them do their thing. Their fish curry is a thing of greatness.

not saying tayyabs is bad at all; it's good; and an advantage of it is it's where it is, ie near other things. (tooting, not so much.) however (and possibly because it is where it is) everyone knows about it so it does get very full. of foodies, too.

Don't we have a word for

Its great , but everyone knows about it = not as great when only I knew about it and it limped on in penury.

For Turnpike Lane curries, Jashan is very good. In particualr its sixteen page full colour glossy laminated menu which has a Delia Smith Complete Cookery Course* brown seventies look about it is a thing of joy in itself.

*You know, Delaia and the egg.

Its great , but everyone knows about it = not as great when only I knew about it and it limped on in penury.

not even: i didn't know about it till guardian guide people started talking about it. if there's one thing worse than people snarking about popular restaurants being popular its people who make a big deal about being on the inside track: i'm sure it's as good, foodwise, as when it wasn't a known thing/before the area got gentrified.

Monsoon on NX Road? How much crack are you on??? I went there once a year or so ago and it was awful awful awful. Nouvelle Spice though, despite the awful name, is the shiznitz. Doesn't really do anything out of the ordinary but sometimes you just need something you KNOW will be nummy. I wouldn't sniff at Bollywood Spice either. Why YES those are the two nearest my house, what of it...

Haha god the Mirch Masala meatshake haha.

Lal Qila on Tottenham Court Road deserves way more love.

I might need to have ten tonnes of curry now.

Yeah Nouvelle Spice is good.

The principal advantage of Brick Lane is being able to pretend you only have about 35p to spend and seeing how far the various curry pimps will bend over backwards to offer you free drinks and that. Once you're in the door they'll practically throw your free onion bhaji at your head though :(

Standard Balti is responsible for me generally having a pen in my bag when I need one and for that I gotta give them some props (walking stick, top hat etc).

Dunno where to put this but this so I'll put it here

http://newyork.seriouseats.com/2013/12/colonial-kitsch-drunken-munkey.html

there are prob a few hundred places like that in london.

and many ipas that brand themselves similarly.

might open a pub selling early 20th century british food and ale in dublin.

What would you call it

black and tans

Beat me to it

A Modest Proposal (gastropub speciality: roasted kid).

The Six Counties

Going back to Dayo's link - do you think the revival of the food fusions are offensive, or just the marketing and look of the restaurant?

I mean, if you do think either are...

I don't think the revival of the food fusions is offensive

The marketing and look of the restaurant certainly gives me pause

The fact that it's owned and operated by a guy who is drawing upon his family's history and interaction with that legacy certainly tempers my reaction toward it

The vast, vast majority of similar places in the UK would be run by British Asians as well. It's an aesthetic thing that echoes some of the issues surrounding Chinese food in the US.

Indian food is seen as a staple not as a 'high-status' dining experience in most cases so restaurants wanting to differentiate themselves from the local tandoori house tend to bring in old luxe trappings, which are generally associated with the interaction between British and Indian elites in the colonial playground setting.

Yeah, I mean, London has quite a lot of that sort of thing, loads of British IPAs have colonial associations and there are a few restaurants that touch on celebrating it too. It seems like sort of pantomime to me. I guess it's interesting to think about which colonies are the subject of this kind of nostalgia - to be fair it prob does involve some positivity towards the place and its cuisine, hence my messing about an Irish one. No romanticism for people posted in far flung Dublin.

xpost I'd say there are some high status places in the UK that are like this.

one of the most hyped restaurants in london right now - http://www.gymkhanalondon.com/

like mayfair must be riddled with this kind of thing...

the best is hillmarton tandoori off camden road btw

but sorry, yes, back to the current topic. what we need is a KKK inspired restaurant or maybe something that celebrates the apartheid?

Yeah, I mean, London virtually every town in the UK has quite a lot of that sort of thing

- fixed

On the UK side the biggest issue at the moment touching on racism and restaurants is definitely the government's decision to reclassify cooking as an unskilled profession, stopping people who want to work as a chef from getting employment visas. Combined with immigration crackdowns that disproportionately targeting Asian / Chinese restaurants, there's a growing sense of unease. People are talking about a lack of trained Indian chefs already and the whole of Chinatown went on strike a couple of weeks ago.

definitely the government's decision to reclassify cooking as an unskilled profession, stopping people who want to work as a chef from getting employment visas.

Had not heard about this, how terrible.