Khans Brasserie - Midhurst

One E V Lucas wrote of Midhurst, ‘Sussex has no more contented town’. Plenty of today’s inhabitants at ease in low beamed Wheatsheaf pub where we congregated (an appropriate term - the place once served as an assembly for Roman Catholics) for drinks before the eating part of Augusts meeting.

Soon rumbling stomachs signaled dinner time. An easy stroll down main thoroughfare of the antiquated town centre to Khans kerbside brasserie.

In from the threshold to find dining room lit with a warm glow, carpeted and inviting.

Team put on a special meal for us. Few dishes actually from restaurant menu. Their efforts were roundly appreciated. Pleasant fare began with sheek kebab, ginger tinged chicken wings and delicious bhajia, light and fresh, luscious innards. Main dishes were of a similar strength but were different nevertheless. Lamb Chops, Chicken Thighs, good King Prawn Balti, onion gravy with subtle tang, moreish Lamb-Pumpkin dish of gentle, sweet, stewy consistency and a sour hint of green chilli. The best vegetable dish was a well executed chana dall that allowed peanut flavour of crunchy chic peas to prevail. Merits a return trip.

Willp2328 score: 6/10

Desert Island Curry

One need not be well off or own a tarted up Ferrari to eat at Chillies...though at first glance one can't help feel an invitation might be required. The Cardiff restaurant resembles nan's front room indeed this is all it is. I'd heard about Chillies from Holly, girlfriend of Ben, bass player in my rock band. She told me she and Ben had been to a place where on Sundays Mondays you could choose anything off the menu, eat as much as you wanted for a price best described as commercial suicide.

On their visit Ben ate so much he couldn't cycle home, Holly carried him some of the way. Good old Ben, stolid as a yeoman, the boy who lived off sliced bread and beans for two weeks when the band were holed up in a recording studio near Reigate (the rest of us enjoyed bizzarre Chinese takeaway offers, 'Evening lunch', 'House of Dinner’). He's only set foot in a hotel once in his life by the way, doesn’t know what it means to be ‘served’. Comes from a big family, holiday together, first second cousins, once twice removed, step mothers, brothers, only the YHA will have them...Dad turned sixty last summer, dreamt of waking up to the sunrise on Glastonbury Tor...he was blindfolded, led to the top and surprised.

Anyhow all this emerged over a mountainous curry at Bay of Bengal. Hill walkers are pioneers, pioneers push boundaries, expand frontiers, I thought myself a hill walking curry eating pioneer, in search of new experience and adventure. Chillies had to be visited, a discovery waiting to happen, I'll be forever glad of it.

On my first visit I simply had the best curry I've ever tasted. Lamb Korci, tender pieces lamb tikka cooked with mince and potato in a thick spicy sauce. If one was forced to survive on a desert island with a revolving choice of eight meals, this would be one, if all of them went off or got swept away in a freak storm, then god willing I'd run through the sand and salvage my Lamb Korci...ummm hmmm.

I’ve been on the Hampshire curry scene for a year. Long enough to visit many a house and enjoy some delectable dishes, in themselves good enough to justify an evening out, even a spot among my desert island curries.

I’ve tasted curry nirvana at the Spice Lounge in the form of Lamb Sali Boti, barbecued meat in a medium spicy red massala, rich and sweet with tomato puree, apricots and coconut, garnished with crisp straw potato. Thrice at the Madhuban, Dhaba Gosht (chunks of Lamb in a thick cashew nut paste, creamy, nutty sweet and refined), Elaichi Gosht (tender meat, an unctuous dark brown gravy with aromatic green caradmoms, woody cinnamon flavours, sliced garlic and an exquisite buttery aftertaste) not forgetting the most superior Lamb Dhansak. Shahanaz’s Jeera Beef, Shapla’s Jalfrezi and Chicken Chilli Massala, are sure to reward a short roadtrip and why trek around Nepal when you can find brilliant Kalejo - chicken livers, deep, rich, with a lingering bittersweet relish – at the Gurkha Chautari?

I'd advise vegetarians to fill the petrol tank (with sunflower oil?) and head in the direction of Grayshott to sample the Gurkha Durbars potato based dishes, Aloo Chana (potatoes and chic peas) Aloo Tama Bodi, bamboo shoots, black eyed beans and spuds, Teel Aloo, all with lovely mountain homestyle flavour to savour. Cinnamon cook their vegetables using the tak-a-tak method, a combined technique of steaming and light stir frying with a minimum of oil, dig out on Moghlai Spinach, dreamily stirred with cream, caramelized onion, sultanas, sweet cinnamon, tempered with savoury garam massala. Appropriately Aubergine serve mean greens from Paneer Kadhai (ripe cubelets of cottage cheese bathing luxuriantly alongside small, sweet hunks of green pepper in a rich silken amber gravy) to Channa Pindi (chic peas in smooth Madras strength sauce giving a gorgeous earthy Bombay mix flavour) as well as a rather special Navratan Korma.

Heavens in here!

August meeting - Midhurst

The table is booked! The Petersfield Curry Club's August meeting will take place on Wednesday 15th, at Khan's Brasserie, 135 North Street, Midhurst. Aperitifs will be taken at the Wheatsheaf, near the top of North Street, about five minutes' walk from the restaurant. The entrance to the central car park is immediately opposite the restaurant - lots of space there, and free parking.

Some friends and I did a reconnaissance trip last night (25th July). The Wheatsheaf is great, serves Tanglefoot and Badger, but look out for the low flying woodwork if you're over 6 feet. Khan's was quiet (wet Wednesday evening) but the food was perfectly OK. We had three starters - chicken chat, tandoori lamb, and onion bhajis. The bhajis were actually some of the best I've tasted - freshly made, hot, light, very tasty; not stale or stodgy. Main courses were jeera chicken, lamb tikka balti, and chicken jalfrezi - all fine.

So that's the plan for August - please let me know if possible through the feedback page on the web site rather than by e-mail. This is because the spam level is getting stupid and I may - very soon - disable the usual address. Not until I've made the web site send its mail somewhere else.

All the best for what remains of the summer...

Golden Curry - Southsea

To step in is to step back in time. I vouch the PLACE hasn’t changed since 1979. Lime green wallpaper, mahogany brown chairs, table lamps, paper napkins, heavy-duty stainless steel cutlery to eat with. SERVICE by old hands polite and functional, prepared to make recommendations. PRICES are lower than nowadays too. Specials with rice circa £7-8.

Began by ordering very crisp Poppadoms for 3. With me, Rich, trainee PE teacher, part time DJ, Aaran, a courier with the travel bug. He tells me best curry he’s ever had from a box somewhere in Birmingham. Indeed the Golden Curry almost of same vintage as pioneering Birmingham Balti Houses. Calls itself a Tandoori restaurant but FOOD cooked with similar principles. For example the meat (lamb or beef), chicken is taken off bone, after being simmered in own juices, and put in your curry. Main course, Korai Gosht, just so. Cuts of lean Lamb in a rich medium sauce, fresh with coriander, slivers of green pepper, stewed toms bursting with juicy flavour. Chana Sag, filling and fibrous, more green pepper and tomato. Started with 2 Shami kebabs, mince burgers, no gristle, hints of ginger, coriander, lemon. 1 well seasoned t’other a tad dry, scorched round the edges.

One shouldn't expect genuine Indian, Bangladeshi fare or innovative fusion. Chutneys include watery mango chutney (a no no), sharp, thin, acrid tasting pickles, something sub contintenals are famed for. Range of starters are unexceptional. Aforementioned Shami Kebabs, ok, sinewy lamb tikka, less so, Tandoori Chicken, just enough flesh on rather mean sized leg. Sundries can disappoint. Pilau rice a bit dull and parched. When a liquid Tarka Dall arrived it kept trying to run away from me as if embarrassed by blackened apperance.

No, the restaurant is all about standard British curry. Juicy, piquant Chicken Chilli Massala had several naunces, kept me coming back for more. Meat Bhuna. Spot on. Arguably best I've tried. Dry, meaty with soothing coconut aftertaste. Bombay Aloo. Supreme waxy potatoes in a mild yet pleasing mush of onion and tomato, underlined with earthy pungency of tumeric.

If first visit to Golden Curry merited a Silver, second time left brassed off. Were it not for good company visit would have been a waste. With so many curry hos* to choose from in the Petersfield, Portsmouth area I wouldn't usually return after a rather average food experience but chance would have it that Aaran, 21 at the time of writing, soon 22 had decided on having an early birthday at the GC. 10 of us sat down together, 2 original Falkland Islanders (gran and grandpa) and a Kenyan (aarans step dad). A lovely evening ensued, everyone enjoyed their meal.

In SUMMARY, the restaurant isn't exactly comparable with other 'top 100', the Madhuban, not really an 'all rounder'. Its a traditional house serving formula curry, big flavours from prime ingredients. Good stuff except nowadays with foodies at large this is becoming the standard.

* houses (I'm not a serial manoganist with a passion for indian women)

Willp2328 score: 6/10

Google Map showing the restaurants we visit

If you click the title, of this post, you can see a map of the restaurants that the Curry Club visits, courtesy of Google Maps. It also shows some nearby suggestions, and obviously these could be scope for future meetings. Feedback welcome!