Monday nights are not the most profitable for a lot of restaurants. My dinner companion had just been given a promotion at work so we decided to go out for dinner. It was too late to book somewhere posh so we walked along to The Clifton.
The restaurant was fairly traditional in appearance, with the addition of a number of waterfalls (in frames) throughout the seating area. There was also a small bar area by the entrance. There were no customers in the restaurant when we arrived so we had our choice of tables. We went by the window.
Some poppadoms arrived almost immediately (although these were charged, singularly which I thought was a bit tight) along with the usual selection of dips. One dip was particularly hot which we enjoyed.
The menu here was fairly extensive with a lot of the normal items you would expect to see on an Indian menu along with a few house specials.
We ordered the Chicken special (as recommended by the waiter), Lamb special (also recommended), Garlic Nan, Chapatis, Bombay potato and Paneer with peas.
The chicken was green. I mean not a nice Green. It looked like baby poo (and without sharing too much didn’t change much in appearance once it had been digested). It tasted a little odd but I can’t accurately pinpoint why. I asked the server why my curry was Green and he explained that they had used colour. I couldn’t believe that they would deliberately aim for a dish to be the colour of baby poo. I most certainly would not order this dish again. (I can’t actually put up the picture i took, it’s just too horrible to look at).
My companion deemed the lamb “acceptable” however less than a third was consumed. The Bombay potatoes were suitably spicy and my companion enjoyed the paneer. I enjoyed the garlic naan which was nice and dry and not greasy.
We had four bug bottles of Tiger and the bill came to just over £50, which wasn’t bad for a meal. On reflection it wasn’t a very good meal, neither of us really enjoyed it and we wouldn’t return. Perhaps £50 is too much for… well nothing really.
Try Lime along the road a little instead– I haven’t written a review because I can’t remember the details of my visit, but I do remember that they had the best Jalfrezi I have tasted anywhere in the world.
The Clfton,32 Westferry Road, London, E14 8LW. Website.
