And so it came to pass that we ended up in Keynsham. Not, you understand, “ended up” as in that “end of the line”/”what the hell are we doing here?” kinda way; more, just, well, we were meandering back from an early evening tour of various branches of Lidl (long story), and we were suddenly starving, and we were probably too late to make last orders in any of our favourite Bath pitstops, and Keynsham was just suddenly… there.
It being a gloomy Wednesday evening’n’all, the High Street was quiet. It seemed, y’know, nice, though; a handful of little indie shops punctuating the familiar high street chains and franchises, lots of apparently quite recent cycle lanes and planted pots doing their thing to add polish, and colour. There were a handful of initially promising little eateries scattered hither and thither too: a canteen-style Chinese restaurant with a really promising menu and a big sign inviting us to ‘Eat In’… but apparently the sign needed updating, and there was only takeaway available. A couple of blocks up the road, a cottage-y style traditional Indian restaurant looked inviting… but the despondent Deliveroo guy slumped across a sofa by the otherwise deserted bar clearly wasn’t going to meet’n’greet us any time soon and, given that we couldn’t see past the bar into the restaurant itself, the initial ‘inviting’ vibe dissipated fast. Three strikes and you’re out, Keynsham!
But luck would have it that we’d parked the car right outside the Tandoori Garden – a smart, brightly-lit affair promising ‘Classic Indian and Bangladeshi Cuisine’ – which just goes to prove that sometimes you’ve been led straight to the place you were looking for before you started going off in search of something else… and as it turned out, we’d happened across the place where the Keynsham locals go when Keynsham High Street is quiet.
As we were ushered to a lovely little table for two offering views across the street to the rather charming Polkadot gift shop I did my usual recce of fellow diners: several well-behaved blokey get-togethers, the like of which are pretty much always settled in any given high street curry house across the land on any given evening; a couple of loved-up couples; two very smart ladies, no doubt making very smart conversation – all in all, a nice mix, making for a lively atmosphere… and a menu that followed suit.
As you might expect, all the Indian/Bangladeshi fave raves are all present and correct here, from bhajis and samosas to bhunas, tikkas, jalfrezis, kormas, vindaloos, et al, with a Tandoori Naga boasting a 1.5m SHU rating (“a favourite with Keynsham Rugby Club”, apparently), a dish rather randomly flagged up as “Judy’s favourite!”, a Chicken Tikka flambéed with Sambuca and Amma’s Homemade Bengali Curry (pre-order only and, at £24.95, almost twice the price of most of the other dishes on the menu) along the way; ooh, interesting!
But it was the sweet chilli scallops on the starter selection that grabbed our attention from the off, so we teamed them up with a Prawn Puri to get the Tandoori Garden party started. Scallops: plump, juicy, perfectly pan-fried, and bathed in a sticky, sour/sweet sauce that, despite its big personality, didn’t overwhelm our delicate seafood superstars. Prawn Puri: rich, tangy, garlic and ginger-laden masala sauce; sweet, tender prawns; crisp, buttery puri – as an amateur connoisseur of Prawn Puri perfection, I can confidently state that this one deserved a gold star.
I dived into prawns again for my main course – a King Prawn Palak (think, a subtler, lighter version of a classic spinach/garlic-laden sagwala) – and tasted enough of the Special Mixed Balti on the other side of the table to be reassured that it was indeed a rather special bucket of enticingly-spiced comfort. Crikey! We’d really lucked in, hadn’t we?
With papadoms, rice, breads, wine and beer our bill came in at around £90 including service, my only quibble being that the price of necessary side dishes such as rice seem quite high in relation to the main courses (and at £4, that was definitely a pricey paratha, yes?). But had we forgone starters (which we could easily have done, as portions go large here) and gone glass-by-glass rather than bottle-by-bottle on the wine/beer front, we could have easily knocked at least £30 off that final tally, putting us firmly into affordable midweek cheer-up territory – and bear in mind that in terms of quality, vibe and “welcome to the neighbourhood” warmth of the overall experience, you really do get what you pay for here.
So: would we return to Keynsham High Street’sTandoori Garden to find out exactly what makes Amma’s Homemade Curry so special? There’s a very high probability that we will, taking a friend of ours who’s always willing to climb the Scoville Scale with us. Will any of us brave that Sambuca-flambéed Tikka, though? Unlikely; I’m happy to leave that dish to the locals.
The Prandial Playground, Bath and Beyond... 