The Aagrah is a traditional curry house, done on an impressive scale. The group now includes twelve restaurants, with sites across West Yorkshire and a couple in South Yorkshire. A new flagship restaurant has just opened in glamorous Leeds, serving a 'taster' style menu. Tapas from the sub-continent.
Shipley is the flagship restaurant, a two storey ex-bike dealership with an a la carte menu downstairs and a buffet upstairs. The menu is Kashmiri, with most of the normal Asian restaurant dishes present, but executed in a more polished and assured way than normal.
We ate there on Saturday, a quick, late-night meal after a gig in town. Arriving at 11pm, the restaurant was still busy. We were seated quickly and brought poppadoms, with a fairly unexciting selection of dips. Some Cobra redressed the balance.
Straight to main courses - I had a lamb pasanda, a rich dish heavy with garlic, yoghurt, onions and tomatoes, finished with fresh coriander leaves. It was excellent, spicy and deep, with a complex blend of flavours. Clearly a curry that has had a lot of thought put into it.
A creamy lamb makhani was lighter on the chilli but laced with pepper - an impressive mild dish. Naan breads were large, covered in garlic and fresh and hot from the tandoor.
It's hard to fault food this good. The Aagrah's food is consistently superb.
We finished eating, and as it was late, passed on dessert (a weak point in any Indian restaurant, this being no exception).
From nowhere, three waiters appeared and whisked our empty plates away with speed and precision that made me wonder if they'd been trained by the SAS in stealth waiting skills. It was quite startling - they managed to clear a table of six in under twenty seconds.
Maybe it was too late and they just wanted to clear the restaurant down, but the whole Ninja service thing just seemed a bit rude. I know that even waiters need to sleep, sometimes, but still, I don't like feeling like I'm being turfed out of a restaurant, especially after a faultless meal.
Aagrah House
4 Saltaire Road
Shipley
BD18 3HN
01274 530880
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4 comments:
What a buzz kill. Their momma's would certainly not be proud.
Glad to have found your blog. I wish I could hear your accent as I'm reading.
First, hooray for a consistently good restaurant. Always a treat when I find one of those. But boo on the ninja service. They should know better.
+Jessie
a.k.a. The Hungry Mouse
Thanks both! This place is a local institution, and it's one of the few local restaurants i know that's managed to grow into a respectable chain whilst still keeping a firm eye on the quality of the food they serve. That's a very rare thing.
And my accent? Northern, Yorkshire...maybe I'll do a podcast someday...
Greetings from Robert-Gilles in Shizuoka, Japan!
Thank you so much on your comments on Smoking!
My friend Patrick is actually English!
You guys are lucky in Old Albion!
Japan has always been a a country of contradictions (lived there for 32 years now!): some of the greatest in the world and everybody smoking over it!
Cheers and all that!
Yorkshire, great puddings and cricket!
Robert-Gilles
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