Travel to the India you’ve always imagined, without leaving Covent Garden. Colonel Saab is an Indian fine dining restaurant that’s full of classic exotic artwork and artefacts. The prices are definitely London, though.
Roop Partap Choudhary started his London Empire in Holborn with his first restaurant, named for his father, Colonel Manbeer Choudhary. Here he collated souvenirs collected by his parents on their travels and created a warm and exotic restaurant.
The Covent Garden ‘branch’, carved from a space that has had more reincarnations than Dr Who, continues that theme with a rather moodily lit interior and a carved temple door from South India. The main staircase has a pure silver door from a temple in Gujarat and ornate chandeliers from Firozabad dangle fetchingly from the ceiling.
It could be a bit naff, but it isn’t. It’s very welcoming and a long way from the London streets surrounding it, once your eyes become accustomed to the low lighting.
The menu is not enormous, which helps when lunch has to be fairly quick in our case. And the first thing that came, along with the obligatory pint of Cobra, was pani puri/golgappa/ puchka (call it what you will). These crispy spheres are always delicious, but must be eaten whole or you’ll lose most of the contents onto the table, or in my case my lap. These were very good, lots of flavours in the gushy mouthful.
For starters proper we went a bit mad and ordered Prawn Chimichurri – grilled spiced black tiger prawns, chimichurri sauce, chaat masala, pickled onions. Mad because at £31.95 this was perhaps the most expensive starter I’ve ever eaten, and I’ve been to Paris, it was superb, however.
Four enormous prawns, verging on mini-lobsters, split lengthways so that getting to the luscious meat was no problem. The mixture of Latin American (chimichurri) with the chat masala was rather fine. The sauce pooled under the prawns and also came in a pot so you could splash on as much as you wanted. On top were the pink pickled onions sliced into tender rounds.The smoky flavours of the grill were well to the fore here and the whole dish was an absolute treat.
We could have happily stopped there on starters, but rashly we’d also ordered Noor Mahal chicken tikka. Noor Mahal is a royal palace in Pakistan and the dish is appropriately rich and succulent. It was also a large portion so yes, we could probably have had just these two starters, and some rice, and walked out happily replete. Not us, though.
Ever professional, we travelled on with ‘Old Delhi’s Famous Lamb Curry’ a keema boti lamb curry cooked in a sardar and a recipe from a famous fast food stop in Delhi. The lamb is cooked to all but falling apart, but there is minced lamb (keema) in there too. It’s a beautifully old school ‘curry’ that has the deep flavours you only get from slow cooking. On the heat scale it was just right, some elements of fire but muted carefully and caringly.
More chicken, because neither of us particularly like fish, with Chicken Chettinad. This Southern Indian dish can come in many variants, but should always have coconut in it and usually some tomato. It’s another dish that benefits from being made well in advance and allowed to rest to develop the flavours, so it’s ideal for a restaurant kitchen. Chicken thigh is the best meat and that’s what we had here all coated in thick, rich sauce that clung lovingly to the meat.
All we needed with it was plain and simple basmati, cooked to fine ‘witches’ fingers’, and some glossy, buttery nan. I often order sides in an Indian restaurant out of initial hunger, then find I can’t do them justice. And it means I can’t order dessert, so we reined ourselves in here to leave space for Rasmalai Milk Cake with a cardamom cream, boondi caviar, pistachio and edible flowers.
This is a soft sponge cake base that’s been generously soaked in sweet, spiced milk and finished off with nuts and pieces of rasmalai. I had to look up Boondi Caviar and found out that it’s a batter of gram flour passed through a strainer into hot oil to form tiny spheres.
It was very luscious, so moist it almost needed a straw, the cardamom was heady on the nose.
Colonel Saab is a bit expensive, but it is Covent Garden. It repays you with a very lovely interior, attentive service and some very good dishes that eschew modernity for classic cooking done very well.
The Covent Garden venue offers an exquisite Indian fine dining experience that captures the essence of both heritage and innovation. The restaurant also boasts a cool, relaxing atmosphere with old-style jazz music, museum-worthy artwork and a modern take on the flavours and textures of India.
40, 42 William IV St, London WC2N 4DD
Indian Sunday Roast – National Roast Dinner Day
The restaurant has launched a reinvention of the Sunday Roast, fusing the British classic with the smoky, spiced and vibrant flavours of a traditional Indian thali.
The £42.95 two course experience is served on a thali and features a choice of signature, tandoori-grilled mains, like Grilled Malai Chicken, Fish Steak and Paneer Tikka.
Each main is paired with grilled vegetables, baby roast potatoes and a warm butter naan, replacing the Yorkshire pudding.
Desserts come in the shape of Gulab Jamun with ice cream, or their famous rice pudding.
Guests can upgrade to bottomless beer, red or white wine packages for £25 per person.
Location: Colonel Saab, Holborn, 193-197 High Holborn, London WC1V 7BD
Available: Every Sunday from 1pm – 3.30pm.
Price: £42.95/person. £25/person bottomless drink option