Indian Cuisine at Salaam Namaste in Bloomsbury

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I love a good Indian feast.

But I espeeeecially love Indian feasts that come accompanied by a side of gossip and friendly chatter with lovely blogger ladies.

Lovely blogger ladies like Natasha, who was my date for the night last Friday.

After finally tracking each down at Holborn, we trundled on up the road to Bloomsbury for a visit to the award-winning Salaam Namaste!

Unassuming on the outside, it’s lovely and cosy on the inside, with low lighting, bright decor and a smiling face to greet you as you enter.

We ordered poppadoms and wine to start (because Friyay) and settled down to a good gossip.

Now, I never usually mention wine. (Mainly cos I ain’t no wine connoisseur, ya know?)

But I’m going to make an exception here, because they actually had a selection of Indian wines on the menu, which I’ve never seen before.

So I decided to try the Indian red… and it was AMAZING. All smokey and fruity and strange and totally delicious.

Definitely worth a try if you ever get the chance!

Our waiter also brought out two tiny fried vegetable cakes drizzled with a sweet sauce, with “the compliments of the chef”.

They were yummy and a lovely little touch, especially as we noticed that ALL the tables got these (not just cheeky food bloggers who are invited to review things!).

The service really was fantastic throughout, and it was so nice to see that they treated ALL their guests like that!

For our starters we went with a selection of different things to share:

Bombay onion bhajis – a classic done OH SO RIGHT. Really crisp, not greasy and full of flavour.

Coriander lime spiced chicken tikka – this was FAAAR too strong on the herbs and neither of us liked it very much. It was just too bitter.

Scallops cooked three ways – the scallops for this were all cooked to perfection, but the sauces were a bit of a mixed bag. The coriander and lime mix was (again) far too strong, the yellow coconut sauce was delicious, and the tomato and lime leaf was good, but a bit bland.

Portobello mushroom stuffed with figs, cashews, spices and home-made cheese – SO MUCH YUM. I’m sad we shared this dish. I wish I could’ve eaten it all. It was such a perfect mix of flavours and textures! So so good.

We went our separate ways with the mains:

Tasha had the Lamb Gilafi Taka Tak which was superb. Minced lamb skewers charred in tandoor and then tossed with peppers in a thick oniony, tomato-y, garlicky curry sauce.

I did my usual thing of making people share their food with me (purely for reviewing reasons, of course…) and it was SO so good. Really rich and flavourful.

For my own dinner, I remembered one of my faves from Gaylord and went for the Murgh Methi Malai Tikka: chicken flavoured with fenugreek and marinated in cheese and cream before being cooked.

It was tender and mild but still SO full of flavour, without being over-powering. Very good stuff!

We also had a bunch of sides, including sesame-seed aubergine (so yummy), Dhal Makhani (too gloopy and bland for us) and a peshwari naan (I LOVE PESHWARI NAAN).

Overall, a really lovely evening and a really lovely restaurant.

I did have a slightly weird moment when I realised that the music playing was a slow-remix album of a really well-known Spanish pop band. Just seemed like such a RANDOM choice. (Spanish pop music in an Indian restaurant in London?)

Some of the dishes really weren’t to our taste (ALL THE HERBY-HERB CHICKEN), but it’s definitely worth heading over to hunt down it’s gems (FIGGY MUSHROOMS, LAMB AND AUBERGINE)

And the service was fantastic. They were so attentive and friendly to everyone, I really can’t fault them.

So if you’re looking for somewhere nice and cheery to go for a date, or a friendly catchup, make sure you check out Salaam Namaste!