The Royal Orchid

Royal Orchid is amongst the better curry houses in Selly Oak and probably the most convenient for most of Selly’s student population being right next to the Tesco Express and a few minutes outside of the Uni campus.
Myself and all my flatmates went here for the first time at the beginning of our second year at Uni and we have been going down as often as possible since: the Orchid tries to stay competitive by offering competitive prices and ‘student deals’ which include a curry with a rice or a naan for a mere fiver. The low price might make you think twice but fear not — everything we’ve eaten there has been mighty tasty. Service has always been reliable and the staff have always been more than friendly in the hope of repeat business from hungry students. I find the baltis to be particularly good, although I have to say I am a bit bias and more in favour of Sundarbon up the road. The Orchid is a little cheaper though, so if you’re aiming for a cheap curry that doesn’t break the bank then look no further.

Following the surprising demise of the extremely tasty Café Eastern Delight, Royal Orchid has taken up the mantle of being the best curry house that the Selly Oak section of Bristol Road has to offer. The Orchid doesn’t waste time on making flashy statements with tacky décor in order to try and entice punters in. Instead, it lets its food do the talking. £6.95 for poppadoms, an onion bhaji, a curry, and either rice or naan belies the fact that the food is actually of a very high quality; I’ve never had a bad meal there. Even better (from a student perspective) is that the restaurant is a ‘bring your own booze’ type establishment, meaning that a quick trip to Drinks2Go across the road will mean big savings when compared to other places around Birmingham. The service is always friendly, and unlike many places who treat their student clientele with contempt, the staff at the Royal Orchid appear dedicated to winning long-​term customers, even giving us free ice cream on one occasion when we the first diners of the evening. Highly recommended.

One night, my boyfriend and I spontaneously decided to go out for dinner, we originally thought we’d walk to our local pub, but it was completely packed and we didn’t fancy arm wrestling for a table and then waiting for hours for our meal. We wondered in to Selly Oak with curry on our minds as an alternative. If you have been to Selly Oak, you’ll know that there are a few curry houses to choose from, but we settled on the Royal Orchid, which is near the Tesco Express. Upon entering I felt a bit put off as the staff didn’t seem to smile at us and when we didn’t order starters I thought the waiter was going to growl! However, my bad feelings soon disappeared when our meals arrived. I had ordered a Chicken Tikka Murgi (not sure on specific spelling as if seems to differ) and it was to die for!!! The flavours were just perfect; tomato based, and yet not too rich or spicy. There were a few other tables of people in, but considering how good the food was, I was disheartened to see that on a Saturday night they weren’t busier! My boyfriend settled for a Chicken Korma which he thoroughly enjoyed. By the end of our meals we were completely stuffed and contemplating how we manage walking back up the humongous (ok maybe not humongous) hill on the way home. Unfortunately, things got worse as the waiter brought over two bowls of complimentary ice cream! Seriously, we thought we would have to be rolled out of the restaurant. It was such a lovely touch to our experience there and after that we were given complimentary coffee too.
The only thing that lets this restaurant down was the fact that they didn’t smile, it would have been nice to have been welcomed with a warm smile as it was out first time there, but it certainly didn’t put us off returning — each to their own I suppose, perhaps they’d had a bad day!
I would definitely recommend trying this place out, I am definitely going again soon.