Topic: Let's have a restaurant review section!

[Yellow Fingers]

I just realised that the one thing missing from this forum is a restaurant review section. I would really like to see this as it would help me to know what's really going on in the Indian restaurants across the country. If the idea is taken up can I suggest that the admin, or whoever, provides a pro-forma review page that you just fill in the blanks on. I personally would prefer it this way to provide some standardisation for the reviews. But, also, I would specifically like sections like description of the curry, to include colour, thickness, known ingredients, guessed ingredients, heat etc. The list could be endless, but my motive is to see what the restaurants are really serving, down to the fine details that anyone who wants to copy it, and I assume that incldes most of this forum, would want to know.

In other words it has to be more than a 'we had three dishes , one was ok , one good but too hot' type of review and more of a ' the vindaloo was excellent, unusually there were whole spices in it, cardamom and cloves, it was quite runny consistency and the fresh red chillies made all the difference' type of review. Detail is what I would require if this is to work effectively.

I really think this could be of help to us all.

So there's my suggestion. Any thoughts?

[Curry King]

Sounds good to me, could also include any extra info gained from talking to the staff\chef etc..

Maybe should be a whole new group for restaurant reviews ?

cK

[raygraham]

I just realised that the one thing missing from this forum is a restaurant review section. I would really like to see this as it would help me to know what's really going on in the Indian restaurants across the country.
Any thoughts?

Good idea Yellow Fingers. My only comment here is that most of us would never get to the particular restaurant on review to try what's reccomended.
I do think a review of the various base sauces / recipes on this site would also be of use to us.
For instance I have just made and reviewed Darth's 99.9% base and Pete has been giving "100 Best Balti" a good going over. Perhaps others might make a choice, let everyone know what they are going to make and review it after. We will then build up a general picture of what bases and recipes the site has on offer.

Ray

[Mark J]

We should rate them first on the food and then on willingness to divulge secrets!  ;D

[Yellow Fingers]

Good idea Yellow Fingers. My only comment here is that most of us would never get to the particular restaurant on review to try what's reccomended.

Hi ray

No, that's exactly what this type of review would not be about. My idea is that the reviews are a way to share the texture, the smell, the ingredients, whatever relates to the dish.

It would not primarily be a review of the curry house, there are many web sites that do that already. Of course a review of the curry house is also nice, but it would be secondary to a review, no not a review, a description of the dishes you had.

What I wanted was a description in as much detail as possible of the dishes that you had. Hopefully that would benefit us all to be able to copy the restaurant style and to see exactly how much difference there really is across the country for each particular curry.

[John]

I agree on this, as there does seem to be some discrepancy around the country on different dishes...ie. in some areas madras is hotter than vindaloo where as Northampton curry houses the vindaloo is hotter than madras.

And i've had varied madras's. i even had a very poor one in leicester when it looked like the sauce was just microwaved and not fryed with the spices as you'd expect a normal dish to be, it just looked like base sauce and tasted like water. and that was from a restaurant Recomened by the "Curry Club" atleast thats what the sticker said in the window.

After speaking with some other friends, they too have said that they've had poor curries from places recommended by "Curry Club"

[Nessa]

What restaurant was that John? I live in the Leicester area so I'd like to avoid it, although your dish sounds eerily similar to the worst food I've ever had, from the Akash on London Rd. I SWEAR the curry was out of a tin, really, I'm not even joking!

Anyway to the original subject, I like the idea of restaurant views a lot, and I like the idea of base sauce/site recipes even more.  I'm fairly confused now in relation to the base sauces and reviews would be very helpful to sort out which ones now are nearer the mark and which ones are not worth bothering with, etc.

[raygraham]

Hi Y.F.
Now I get the picture better. Sorry but I misunderstood your original meaning.
I think it a good idea but I personally find explanation a bit awkward. Curry is quite complex in it's tastes and textures and describing what you experience in words is to me hard. However, I can only try. Some of the photo's on the site speak more than words so how about more of these!

We have a lot of recipes for bases etc on this site but not too many folk trying them out and reporting back. I would like to encourage more members to try out what's on offer and review these on the site.
For instance I intend to go back to the "100 Best Balti" book and recreate their three bases and following that am going to try the two stage restaurant base by Mridula Baljekar.
And as you say the gradual addition of this sort of info can only be a positive step forward for us all.

Ray

[John]

What restaurant was that John? I live in the Leicester area so I'd like to avoid it, although your dish sounds eerily similar to the worst food I've ever had, from the Akash on London Rd. I SWEAR the curry was out of a tin, really, I'm not even joking!

I think it could be the same place, its a white fronted building right next door to another tandoori, and its on the right hand side as you walk away from the railway station and away from the town, about 5min walk from railway station.

[Nessa]

I think it must be the same place John, sounds spot on. It's on Leicester's very own 'curry mile', or in reality  the 'curry few hundred yards'.  For some reason it's always cited as the best place in town and everyone knows it and thinks of it as such. This makes me sad.  They must be trading on past glories with another chef and owner, or something.