Flavours Of India

We ordered take away as we were looking for something quick and it was nearby. We ordered chicken, rice and nan. The service was fast and we were home minutes after picking up the food.
One could smell the curry from well outside the resto which made me a bit suspicious of the quality of the food but it was tasty and not much more. The sauce was not complex but hit the spot. The rice was unremarkable and the nan not up to standard but neither was it bad. Overall, standard fare but nothing you would spend much time figuring how they made it.

When we entered, it was about 6pm, before the dinner rush hour. As soon as we entered, i asked the host if the spice level could be adjusted to mild or not spicy, he said yes and proceeded to seat us. The restaurant had 3 tables of customers and we were a party of two. They gave us the choice of sitting either in the dark cramped corner near the registers where they answer phones and constantly walk back and forth OR sitting smack in the center of the room where the draft comes in whenever the front door opens. I pointed and I asked if we could sit elsewhere, they said we were only two people and these tables are for larger groups. Mind you it was 6pm and there were plenty of empty tables. They ended up seating us by the cramped registers. The host/​owner seemed grumpy, rude, and not at all accommodating. When i placed my order and asked it to be mild, he said he cannot make something that is spicy, less spicy. He misled me because i asked him prior to being seated. I chose something else. The food was not good at all. I definitely had better. The service was horrible, food was mediocre and this whole experience left a really bad taste in my mouth… Literally!

So I decided to get Indian take away with a friend and we called in with our order and went there to pick it up (as they don’t deliver). Even though we mentioned the numbers of the dishes it turns out they misheard most of our order and changes had to be made. They were awfully nice about it, but I was soooo hungry … lets say I wasn’t the most gracious of guest.
The bill was also giving me a bit of a fright. Rather expensive for a take out, but maybe the size and taste would make up for it. To be honest the taste was great, but the size of the portions was rather disappointing. Lets just say there were no left overs … unheard off when it comes to Indian take away.

Note from the author: I’m not sure if my memories of the events of that night are completely accurate or if the mixture of delusion from hunger and nostalgia have swayed my vision of what occurred. That being said, this is how I remember that chilly winter night.
I stumbled into this Flavours of India on an extremely cold night in December a couple years ago. I had been walking aimlessly all day and exploring the parts of the city that weren’t on the tourist guides. My feet had finally had enough and my stomach is screaming for some hot food, so when the «Flavour of India» sign appeared as I turned the corner, my frozen face grinned with delight and I stepped inside.
I asked for a table for one, which seemed to be a shock to them considering most lonely singles take their meals to-​go. The restaurant was far too pretty and the outside temperature was far too cold for me to think of take-​out though.
I chatted it up with the waiter, a young man who was curious about America since he was considering moving to my home town of LA to go work for his Uncle there. I told him to bring me two dishes, the most popular dish and the dish he eats on his break. For the most popular, he suggested the Chicken Makhani and he said he would have the chefs make the other dish.
When they finally walked the food up the spiral stairs next to my table from the kitchen below, the smells filled the air full of spice and aromatic goodness. Within seconds of the food being placed on the table, I dug in. Now I’m not sure if it was the fact that I was so hungry, or maybe that I had been walking in the cold for so long, or even that the food was just that good, but this was probably my most memorable Indian meal ever. Even though in reality, it probably wasn’t the best Indian food, in those exact circumstances on that particular night, nothing could have tasted any better.
I showered my waiter with praise and asked him to tell the chef that it was my favorite meal I’d had on my entire trip, even beating out any place I’d eaten in Paris and Rome. I think it’s safe to say now that it probably wasn’t the best restaurant I ate at, but I still stand by the statement that it was my favorite. Regardless, you could tell it made their night. The waiter couldn’t stop smiling and you could see the owner bragging to another waiter about the statement with pure delight. My comment had made their night and their food had made mine.
If I ever go back to London, I’m not sure if I will go back to Flavours of India. Not because I don’t want to, but because with an experience like the one I had, I don’t know if it could be anything but a letdown. Everything was in it’s right place and the result was a perfect meal and a incredible memory of the Indian restaurant I found along the way to nowhere. Like a 16 year old remembering their first love is how I remember Flavours. To risk spoiling that image just isn’t worth it.

Decent food, slightly grumpy service and a bit on the expensive side. Worth a stop in if you are lazy (and staying nearby as I was) They add service in which is annoying when the service was kind of sort of bad.

I picked up a takeaway curry from here to share with a friend who I was visiting.
The interior of the restaurant is quite unique. There’s split level dining with a open plan allowing the upstairs diners to look straight down onto the ground floor. However, the most eye-​catching decorative piece is the complete front of a TATA car which is on the front of the main counter.
I ordered the bhuna (lamb) ghosh and the king prawn kadhai along with onion bhajee
They kindly supplied some mango chutney for the bhajee but no lemon to squeeze. However, the taste was fine and the bhajees weren’t soggy which can sometimes happen if they’ve been packed into containers too soon
The bhuna ghosh was lovely, augmenting the lamb with a rich, deep, aromatic spice mix. The king prawn kadhai was lighter and was a nice contrast to the ghosh. I struggled to find much dried fruit in the peshwari naan.
It was a decent curry at a decent price