This review also features on Bristol Bites - Bristol's biggest food blog...
The first curry house in England opened
over 200 years ago and thus began the great British love affair with Indian
food. From Queen Victoria to those of us craving a post pub meal on a Friday
night, we can’t get enough of the stuff which is why I find it truly
astonishing that there are so many bad curry houses about. You know - the ones
that serve tiny cubes of meat lost in a luminous sauce topped with a scalding
pool of florescent oil. But here in Bristol, we’re blessed enough to have the
pick of some very good Indian restaurants, the Bengal Raj being one of them.
Opened in 1998, it was the second of two
Indian restaurants opened by four brothers. The first one is the acclaimed and
multi awarded Brunel Raj in Clifton Village. The Bengal Raj is situated within
a few doors of the excellent Stoke Bishop Fish Bar (it’s sister shop also
residing in Clifton Village), and its tranquil location belies the cuisine
inside.
I visited the Bengal Raj with my OH, mother
and brother at 7.30 on a Friday evening and the first thing I noticed that the
inside of the restaurant was a bit beige and entirely different to the more
quirky Brunel Raj but it was packed out – surely a good sign! Although busy we
weren’t kept waiting at all and our waiter was quick to collect our drink and food orders.
We opted for popadoms to start with and
they came with a fully laden tray of delicious looking dips and pickles –
cooling minted yoghurt, fragrant mango chutney, sweetened coconut, sour lime
pickle and a very finely diced onion salad.
For our main dishes we ordered a lamb
dhansak, chicken tikka rezala, chicken kerala and a chicken achari. My mother
ordered the achari but as she rarely finds Indian curries hot enough for her we
spoke with the waiter and he offered to take it to the level of a madras but
offered more chillis should she need them. We also ordered sides of sag paneer
(spinach with Indian cheese) and brinjal bhaji (aubergine) along with a variety
of naan breads and a tandoori roti.
Our food was brought to us steaming hot in
beautiful hammered curry bowls which our waiter told us were made to order
especially for them from a manufacturer in London – they were deceptively large
as they were much deeper than ordinary curry bowls which meant the portions
were very generous. All of the dishes
smelt wonderful and were extremely appetizing in appearance – no day-glo sauce
and certainly no pools of oil floating on the top.
The dhansak was hot, sour and sweet all at
the same time with a great depth of flavor and made the perfect pairing with my
peshwari naan which was light and fluffy with sesame seeds scattered over the
top providing a pleasing texture. The chunks of lamb were tender and meltingly
soft, I was able to cut through them with just my spoon.
The chicken dishes were packed full of
large pieces of moist chicken breast but most important of all – they all
tasted completely different. I’ve been to so many curry houses where the dishes
all look the same and barring different ‘heat levels’, all of them taste the
same. The rezala was thick and flavoursome with tomato and onion and the kerala
was highly spiced with fresh coriander, fennel, cloves and red chillis but
could definitely have been hotter.
The achari came and it was delicious –
sharper than you would expect as it is cooked with both lemon and lime juices
but not in an overly acidic way, just enough to enhance the taste of the other
spices and as requested the chef had slipped a few fresh green chillis into it
to try and bring up the heat level. Although still not hot enough for my Mum,
it was great that they had tried to cater for her and she was very pleased with
it – no easy feat, I can assure you!
I’m a massive fan of spinach in general and
sag paneer is one of my favourite side dishes – again we were given a generous
portion and the iron heavy spinach was cooked with fragrant garlic and lovely
chunks of paneer cheese with the texture of firm tofu.
The brinjal bhaji was also delicious – due
to it being an aubergine dish, it was understandably quite oily but that was to
be expected. Cooked with tomatoes and onions, the smokey aubergine’s white
flesh was almost creamy and was delicately flavoured with cumin. The only thing
to question was that the tandoori roti was quite soft like a chapatti rather
than being crispy on the outside but that might just be down to a regional
variation
The dishes were so huge that we had to take
a lot of it home with us and the very friendly waiters were more than happy to
bag everything up for us. It was a thoroughly enjoyable meal and we will
definitely be back to tackle other things on the menu, especially the many cast
iron sizzling dishes that we were eyeballing at another table! If you haven’t
found your ‘HG’ go-to curry house yet, I urge you to try the Bengal Raj – and
wear your stretchiest trousers!