Choudhury Tandoori, Bedford
Thursday, 22 February 2001
restaurant factfile

Another trip down the long and winding road to Bedford. This time we hadn't booked a table so we dived into the nearest open doorway from which the fragrant smell of curry was emanating. As luck would have it, the Choudhury could squeeze us in. Even more luckily, we'd arrived on special offer night and could choose of almost any starter, main course, rice, side dish and coffee or ice cream for a very reasonable £8.95. The service was pretty prompt and in no time we found our starters had arrived.

Always on the lookout for a bargain (i.e. a cheapskate) PhilS had opted for the Hali Mixed Starter a veritable banquet containing onion bhaji (minging), sheek kebab (excellent), chicken leg (respect) and "some curry". The most expensive starter on the menu and well worth it. IanD and SteveB showed a little more restraint and ordered the obligatory sheek kebabs and some chicken "shamiesque" kebabs. The Sheek kebabs arrived on sizzler with a few fried onions. Two short rissoles but with a large girth - they tasted good but not too spicy. Chicken kebabs were compact chicken burgers in a fairly tasteless coating - Bernard Matthews would have been proud!

The Chicken Chilli Massalla had loads of hot chillies but the sauce itself was tame. There was, however, plenty of well cooked chicken. The Chicken Tikka Surma earned a 'Very Nice!' from SteveB, Very tender chicken pieces, in a thick medium spicy tasty sauce. IanD had never tried a Chicken Tikka Dhaka but was glad he did. An excellent dish just the right side of too hot and just the right amount of meat. Our three veggie side dishes were cauliflower bhaji (OK), onion bhaji (again a bit on the minging side - crisp on the outside with a bland centre) and Bombay potatoes (the best of the bunch). The pilau rice was quite good but the portion was a bit niggardly whilst the plain nan was "not bad". We rounded the whole meal off with some surprisingly good vanilla ice cream and a single cup (no refills) of coffee.

We were quite impressed by the Choudhury - the meal was a bargain at £8.95 (apparently a couple of weeks earlier, an even better bargain at £6.95!) but when the drinks (1 pint of lager each) and a tip were added, the total cost was £13 per head. We'd had Kingfisher so perhaps the 'pub' lager would have been more reasonably priced. The food was mostly very good - fortunately the bad OB's didn't affect the rating as we hadn't had them as starters. We'd
certainly recommend the place and look forward to a future visit.

Note: It turns out the £8.95 Special Offer wasn't so special after all. It's available all day - every day! Cheap curries whenever you want them, that'll be the Choudhury!

The Scores

Which gives an overall rating of 4 bhajis.