The Colonial Restaurant

Review:

This week we go to an uncharted territory. The Colonial Restaurant becomes the first Indian restaurant for us to review! We were quite intrigued by its concept of British Indian cuisine. I then invited my friends from the UK to join me and gave an opinion on how ‘authentic’ the restaurant was.

Tapas

Interestingly, the Colonial restaurant has a selection of Tapas on their menu. They creatively transform Indian dishes into Tapas-sized delicacies.

We ordered quite a few Tapas, especially the platters:

–          Onion Bhaji ($6) – Fritter of Onions and spring onion (Deep-fry) served with mint and date chutney

–          The Colonial Vegetarian Platter ($10) – Vegetarian samosa, batata bara, onion bhaji and Paneer Tikka, Served with Mint and Date chutney

–          The Colonial Non-Veg Platter ($14) – Meat samosa, lamb lollipop, chicken tikka and Chicken drumstick, served with mint chutney

–          Seafood Platter – Prawns, deep fried fish and calamari, served with tomato chilli chutney

So, unless you have a dish that you really like, I suggest you ordered the platter. I loved how their complementary sauces worked differently depending on the dish.

A La Carte

We ordered quite a few a la carte dishes which were mostly different kinds of curry. However, I didn’t get the chance to try the vegetarian ones.

Straight off the bat, we were quite fixated with the Railway Goat Curry. The description also reinforced our belief: goat meat cooked in yogurt, bay leaf and saffron! However, we felt that the dish was overshadowed by the others. Our next dish, Chicken Tikka Masala, was promoted as Britain’s National Dish! So, we felt we really must get that. It was a well-balanced dish with capsicum, onion and tomato sauce.

We felt that the best dish of the day was the Mango Chicken. Cooked in mango pulp liquor (you can have the non-liquor version), this dish had the perfect recipe to be my favourite: sweet, tasty and flavoursome. To round up the a la carte menu, we had Beef Dhansak, diced beef cooked with lentils and spiced.

Mango Chicken ($17) – Boneless chicken cooked in very mild spices with coco cream and mango pulp liquor (Suntory Mohala)

Beef Dhansak ($17) – Diced beef cooked with lentils and spices

The Rest

Normally, you enjoy Indian food with either bread (naan or paratha) or rice. They have quite a large selection of naan and rice. I think it is better to have the plainest tasting one because the dishes are already very rich.

You should also order Pappadums and mint chutney as they were very nice!

Unfortunately, this time around they ran out of their dessert special: The Colonial Special Creme Brulee. It might have been a great finish for our lunch. We had to settle for part of the dessert, Gulab Jamun.

The verdict for The Colonial – British Indian Cuisine

I was very impressed on how the Colonial restaurant was very well-presented. You can have the option of enjoying the usual Indian dishes or Tapas-style dishes with Indian influence.

Rating for the Colonial:

7.0 / 10

Taste: 7.0 / 10

Price: $35 per person

Place: 8.0 / 10

Details:

118 Crown Street, Darlinghurst 2010

02 8084 6700

http://www.thecolonialrestaurant.com.au/