Fitzrovia, Indian Restaurant Guide

This Keralan veteran near the Telecom Tower is “still producing good food after all this time” (almost 40 years), offering “super value” and “friendly service”. The new interior “hasn’t made it a looker, but there are so many great dishes on the menu, so who cares?”

2022 Review: Chef Krishna Negi (who first made his name when he launched Tangawizi in Richmond in 2004) opened this Fitzrovian basement spot in October 2019, with a menu featuring ‘nano plates’ (small plates and sharing bowls) inspired by 1947’s partition of India. Some initial reviews on its cuisine have been very upbeat.

“Very tasty dosas” headline the “wide range of delicious, South Indian vegetarian dishes”, “with many unusual choices” at this “unassuming-looking” small chain, whose most central branch is just off Leicester Square. “The food is good enough even to silence grumbling carnivores like me!”

2021 Review: “Simply delicious south Indian cuisine” from the state of Tamil Nadu – including “the best dosas ever” – means this “justly popular independent” in Fitzrovia “is very different from your usual curry house”. “I’m slowly working my way through the menu and have yet to find something I don’t like”.

This contemporary two-year-old near Selfridges (on the former site of Gaylord, RIP) is the first London venture from New Delhi-based Azure Hospitality, and serves an “intriguing” menu inspired by the posh Mumbai suburb it is named after. The kitchen uses high-quality British produce, including some “interesting veggies”, to produce cooking that’s “full of enjoyable flavours”. Meanwhile, down in ‘Bandra Bhai’, the basement ‘smugglers den’, you can find some “dangerously delicious cocktails!”.

“Still offering great value” for “fresh and really tasty food”, this canteen is one of the stalwarts of the ‘Little India’ enclave behind Euston station, where Indian students gathered to eat from the 1950s. The daily vegetarian buffet lunch is a steal at under £10, while the meat and fish options on the main menu are not much more expensive.

This canteen has served “delicious, great-value vegetarian thalis” and other South Indian specialities in the ‘Little India’ enclave behind Euston station for almost as long as the Queen has been on the throne. “Long may they reign their dosas over us!”

“Really good and cheap veggie food” has established this fixture as a popular dining choice in the Little India street behind Euston station. The buffet lunch is even better value.

A taste of Kolkata, via New York – these “Indian fast-food” joints in Soho and Bethnal Green serve buttery paratha flatbreads rolled around fillings originally grilled on skewers (kati means skewer), the street food from home that founder Payal Saha missed when she moved to Manhattan 21 years ago.

“Absolutely delicious” Indo-Chinese dishes (inspired by the Hakka-influenced cuisine of Kolkata) makes it worth discovering these slightly offbeat eateries in Soho and Covent Garden: (“delectable chops, and it even converted me to liking okra!”).