Hello everyone, now that we've successfully managed a couple of KFC trips, I'd like to expand the journey to far, far lands. I'd like to go to London and have some Chipotle http://www.google.ch/#hl=de&source=h...ed59323e95363e

and a decent curry meal. We can either fly or drive and I'd preferably like to stay for the weekend. This is just a thread to get some ideas going regarding dates, places to eat some decent curry as well as to see who'd like to join.


-LIB

I'd love to join but as I need a visa to enter the kingdom I think I will have to pass, unless we delay this for two years once I already (hopefully) have an EU passport *fingers crossed*

Try Brick lane. A whole street of curry houses. Quality varies - the plainer ones are generally the best. Formica tables = home cooking .

Feb/March is good for me. And flying...

It really isn't worth driving, you lose a day and the expenses rack up (fuel, tolls, ferry crossing). If you book in advance you can pick up Easyjet flights for less than CHF 100 RTN (BSL>Gatwick), then either take the Gatwick Express train into London, or hire a car at the airport (~GBP 25 a day). In terms of accomodation, I would avoid the crappy 1-star hotels around Paddington, Bayswater etc.. and instead stay in the Suburbs (e.g. Ealing, Harrow, Wembley.. basically anywhere on the London Underground map). At most you're looking at 30 mins to get into the centre of town and you get to make the most of your one day travel card.

Alright...we're gonna fly. I was hoping that we could late January. Porsch, would that be psosible for you?

and every single one of them has at some point been shut down by enviromental health

I used to work over the road from brick lane, excellent food

Ahhhh, CHIPOTLE...I think I mentioned that on the KFC thread. The Mrs. and I will definitely try to find a way to go!

Just to confirm we will go to KFC as well for one of the meals?

if you can fill a car it would be quite cheap, we can do kent on a couple of tanks of fuel and 8 hours from zurich, between 5 that would be quite cheap and a damn site more reliable then easyjet.

someone with a decent diesel would be able to do it on 1 tank there and back.

The curry houses in Brick Lane are generally terrible. They deliver a generic cuisine - the fact that they have dozens of dishes on their menus betrays the fact that they are re-using the same sauces and just tinkering with things a bit.

Why?

In the most part they are catering for pissed up City boys and tourists.

There are some decent places that don't conform to this awful model though:

Go north on Brick Lane until you hit Bethnal Green Road and then turn right. There's a good restaurant called Maida. This is a Pakistani grill (ignore the chinese stuff on the menu) restaurant (in contrast to the Bangladeshi places on Brick Lane). They have a quite modern approach, good grillled meat and fish and great bread. NB: It's strictly Islamic and no alcohol is allowed.

My favourite place in London is New Tayyabs. Go south on Brick Lane until you hit Whitechapel Road and walk around to the back of the mosque. Depending on the day and time there might be large queues. It's another Pakistani grill house, the mainstays are lamb chops, chicken tikka, sheekh kebabs etc. They come on a sizzling platter. Great fresh naan too. They've recently revamped their curry dishes too. They have really good baby pumpkin curry and I love their 'small prawn'.

On Brick Lane itself, you can avoid the crappy places and get something a bit more honest at Sweet and Spicey. It's a basic café with pictures of Kashmiri wrestlers on the wall. I really like the biryanis here.

You might think that I've got something against Bangladeshi places. Not a bit of it. Try these places if you want to get something better than the generic:

Kolapata serves proper Bangladeshi food, including beef curries, fantastic lamb biryanis and super-comforting Haleem.

Chaat is a break from tradition, a Bangladeshi restaurant with a modern-style. Great cooking too.

I'll post again later today with some Goan, Keralan, Gujarati etc. places.

I don't think thats possible, unless perhaps you're driving a Polo Diesel Bluemotion with the cruise control set to 65 mph. With sensible driving I can eke out ~900km on a full tank of diesel, which is about the distance from Basel to Dover.

no idea, just basing it on clarkson being able todo london to scotland and back in that audi diesel, roughtly the same distance isn't it

The man is a cheat.. he'll do anything to beat May/Hammond

The wife will just be back in the country beginning of Feb so I was thinking end of Feb or start of March

Totally agree. Best Pakistani curry in London. Super cheap too. Terrible service but that's part of the fun. Highly recommend the baby aubergine.

..come on, we live in Switzerland, how bad can it really be?

Service has somewhat improved now that they've opened a downstairs area to cater for increased demand.

The best way to get good service is to become a regular . . . you'll get a table in the VIP area and prompt service. If they really like you and you're a regular you can skip the queue too.

OMG - Chipolte in Europe! So very pleased to see this. I am from Colorado and get serious cravings for this place. One of the first I hit when back home.

Super cool! (Wishing for it to arrive in CH)

I'd also mention that if you do go to Tayyabs, or some of the other places around there you're in easy reach of superb nightlife.

- Bar 1001 - (an institution, but I rarely end up there)
- Big Chill Bar (cocktails, bit mainstream)
- The Pride of Spitalfield (trad)
- 93 feet East (club/bar/venue)
- The Carpenter's Arms (this is an excellent pub)
- The Castle (disturbing, dubious fun at the latest opening pub I know)

There's even more a bit further afield. Just let me know what kind of places you're after and I can let you know.