Aye, it’s a warm one
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Variation (due to available ingredients) on my Sri-Lankan Chicken curry. Also decided that as well as the usual Scotch Bonnet and Naga Chillis it might be a good idea to stick a Habanero in there too… 
Normally it’s hot, today it’s nuclear
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Off to Ashas in Birmingham tomorrow evening. A visit to the pub first is needed, having looked at their drinks prices 
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I liked it there but my usual fav starter (chaat) wasn’t great so suggest you avoid that one
Tom cruise also a big fan, liked it so much he stayed for a repeat of his order apparently
Hip flask helpful as you suggest bob
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This is a part of gentrifying what was a cheap meal out by putting it into a premium’ and stylish modern setting.
For me they have to also offer a discernible shift from ‘restaurant style’ to traditional ‘home style’ Indian cooking, which means you can tell there is lots of high quality and fresh ingredients.
Went I went to Dishoom I was so disappointed I complained. What I saw was average restaurant style cooking with an emphasis on presentation and mezze style portions. They tried to persuade me that they cooked everything from scratch in-house (the kitchen cooking area is open and visible to the restaurant) , but when I said show me your ingredients they were less keen.
I expect Asha to be much better and hope so too as I’m going there end of January . Look forward to your review Bob 
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Yea , at those prices i want to know the chicken didn’t arrive in the form of a 10kg frozen slab pre tikka’d from the Netherlands etc… as you say something more authentic rather than ingredients served up in restaurant style sauces .
I grew up spending time in the kitchens of my friends of a weekend, being little helper to their mothers from India and Pakistan, so I got a taste for traditional home style cooking.
When my dad brought home Indian takeaways my reaction was ‘what is this shit supposed to be?!’
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Something similar here with one of my mates I went through college and university with. We started working for IBM at the same time. As the way the shifts worked I would drop him off after an early and his mum made me lunch and when I picked him up for a back shift his mum made me lunch.
I still love you Rav.
I used to go to the Shish Mahal on Gibson st Glasgow (inventor of the Tikka Masala) but it wasn’t a patch on Indian home cooking.
X.
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Yes I remain unconvinced by the idea of upmarket Indian restaurants. To discover there’s one in London with two Michelin stars! And yet the curries still look like standard base gravy led restaurant dishes. I saw nothing I wouldn’t expect from a better Edinburgh restaurant, and for normal money.
Feels like they’re leaning on service / decor / ambience as justification for the prices, it’s certainly not in the ingredients and processes
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For my 50th my wife booked a weekend of curry in London all three Michelin starred, they were all very good tbh
I really liked the tamarind best if the three but not sure it was better than the majestic Gurkha in droitwich or the murghli in Manchester both of which are half of the cost and my current favs
I do like curry
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I ate in Bernares in Mayfair, Atul Kochhar’s 1 star place, the spiced lamb cutlets are probably the best I’ve ever tasted though I was shitfaced at the time.
It also had a Japanese style automatic toilet which was worth the trip alone.
Mother India in Glasgow is probably my favourite for home cooked type dishes rather than typical curry shop, dyed to the max stuff.
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Clays in Caversham (Reading) is really good.
Not cheap but really good and not a chicken tikka massala in sight.
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https://rootsteddington.co.uk/our-story/
Went to this place in Teddington in the autumn. Amongst the best Indian food I’ve had outside India. Really amazing. Every flavour was so defined and vivid, and in no way stereotypical. We actually went because it was the leaving dinner for my partner’s brother, sister-in-law and daughter, who were moving a few days later to Goa. She is Indian, so he now has an indefinite spousal visa, and they had had enough of the London rat-race, and thought they’d give a different life a try. Now we are going to visit them, spending 6 weeks in Goa, then going down to Kerala for a month, so I imagine I’ll have some contributions to make to this thread! Not my first time in India by any means, but my first time there in 16 years.
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And there’s the rub.
I don’t do it very often but IMO most upmarket Indian restaurants genuinely offer something different.
I like Trishna in Marylebone
and even our local Heritage Dulwich punches above its weight
https://heritagedulwich.co.uk/
My mate-with-the-burn-rate goes here quite often
edit: this with the proviso that I don’t seem to experience food in the same way as many. Most of the time I can take it or leave it.
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It’s a shame you lot are fucking northern monkeys so won’t be able to visit these but…
This place in Southampton is really good. Went there last year and I do like a Goan fish curry but they only do a Goan prawn, asked if they could a fish one instead and “no problem, we’ll make that for you” Was knockout
Old favourite was Kutis in Oxford St, when I lived in Oxford St we’d be in there at least once a week. Unfortunately burned down but there is another one in Wickham. Expensive but the food is outstanding
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Kuti’s - fuck me that’s a blast from the past - ca. 1990 it was the only decent curry shop in the whole of Hampshire: tandoori quail to die for!
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