Shezan

 

Remember the days when exotic meant 'Chilled Melon with a touch of Port'? Well, those days are alive and well at Shezan, a once-pioneering restaurant, which has apparently not changed its menu in three decades. Other comic highlights of the starters menu include mulligatawny soup and avocado shrimp.

This is a real shame, for Shezan was the original gourmet Indian restaurant, which opened people’s eyes to the possibilities of authentic cooking methods and paved the way for the superb cuisine of places like Chor Bizarre and Quilon. During the 1970s it became the only restaurant to receive the coveted Egon Ronay award and Restaurant of the Year Award in the same year.

And to be fair, this remains a perfectly decent curry house. At £10-15 for a main course, prices are well above average for Indian food, but not so high considering the Knightsbridge location. A mixed dish of items from the Tandoor was carefully prepared and included faultlessly succulent Changezi Chaap (marinated lamb chops). Chicken Jalfrezi was perhaps a little underspiced for the cosmopolitain modern palate, but the Tarka Dal was addictively smooth. Bland but soothing décor was accompanied by some fantastic piped music (when was the last time you heard Minnie Ripperton on a curryhouse stereo?) and the service was faultless. Though Shezan does not have the slick style of its gourmet rivals, it combines 1970s retro charm with good, basic Indian cooking.