Spice Trader, City of London

Spice Trader 9-10 Philpot Lane London EC3M 8AA Tel - 02079292229 www.spicetraderlondon.com Cuisine - Indian I have visited Spice Trader for a number of years and it has never changed. A more traditional take on Indian food, which is nice to see sometimes as there are a number of Fusion Asian restaurants around now. With plain decor, the curry house hangs its focus on its friendly service and food. As usual we skipped the starters after sharing a few poppadoms with chutneys including onion and tomato, mango chutney, the very hot spices lime pickle and creamy raita dip. For the mains we ordered a two Chicken Kurai's and a Chicken Shashlik whilst sharing a Mushroom rice which was served like most rice dishes in indian cuisine and a mushroom bhaji which was excellent. The Shashlik was cooked well and the peppers and onions on the skewer offered lovely flavour and texture, whilst the Kurai dishes offered a spicy, wetter option on the table. The food here is good but there is nothing to get to excited about and lacks a certain zest in terms of menu choice. I return to this restaurant for its always friendly service and the fact that I have never had a bad meal. We shared a number of Cobra's and the restaurant also serves the very rare Mongoose beer which is very similar but earns its selling power to the fact that in India the Mongoose eat Cobra's. Before ordering the bill we had a very sweet Irish coffee. Free kumal and amaretto's were on offer. For three of us the bill came to around c£120 which is a good £40 over priced. Gastrogreglarr rating: 6.5/10 Gastrogreglarr likes: having been visiting for around 8 years to not have had a bad meal in that time is good going Gastrogreglarr dislikes: not as competitively priced as other city curry houses Greg Duignan Broker 07775785392