Name: Chowki
Address: 2-3 Denman Street, London, Soho, W1D 7HA, UK
Telephone: +44 (0) 20 7439 1330

Tucked away behind Piccadilly Circus, Chowki was almost full to capacity on the Tuesday evening I visited. By the same people as Mela, which has various branches in the West End and further afield, they seem to be doing something right judging by their popularity.

The ambitious menu promises food from Goa, Lucknow and Punjab, and amongst the many deals available the best value are possibly the Chowki pots, which include a curry pot, a rice pot and a daal pot served on a cute tray and all from as little as £6.95 or £9.95 with naan bread.

There is plenty to choose from, therefore to start off with we ordered a salad and the sweet potato chat, which consisted of roasted potatoes with sweet & sour chutney and pomegranate seeds, and not actual sweet potatoes as we were expecting. A very promising start.

For the mains we all opted for Chowki pots. The Kadhi Pakori (£9.95) consisted of onion and spinach dumplings with a yoghurt dressing. The Saag Paneer (£10.50) had cubes of fried cheese mixed in with spinach, garlic and onions, and a split pea daal which had to be eaten cautiously due to its spiciness. The Yam curry (£10.50) had red pumpkin pieces in a masala curry, a concoction of coconut milk and spices.

We drank Cool Cucumber cocktails and Green Tea mojitos, the former a blend of mashed cucumber, Wyborowa vodka and apple juice; the latter a very refreshing drink of Havana rum, green tea, mint, lime and sugar.

The staff seemed very amused with us - perhaps because we seemed to know what we were ordering - and even warned us against trying the Jal Jeera drink saying it was too strong a flavour for us. Never challenge a foodie, as after one arrived at our table and was passed around we immediately ordered two more much to the waiter’s dismay. A salty drink made with cumin and mint, we gulped it down with our food.

Despite being very full by now we couldn’t pass up desserts: Badam Halva, a cardamom and almond pudding, Gulam Jamun, a syrupy, sweet dumpling with vanilla ice cream, and Kulfi, a type of ice cream, were all devoured very quickly.

The meal came to roughly £25 a head, reasonable given what we had, and very pleasant. We skipped off to more laughter from the waiters, but feeling satisfied and pleased with ourselves.

Chowki

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