Paprika, Nightingale Road

Team Score:

 

Maurice's Review

I was interested to try this place as I had heard mixed reviews, quite a few were on the negative side, but the most recent reviews on place like Trip Advisor all appeared positive. Therefore I think there was a recent takeover.

On arrival I was surprised to see a nice bright well spaced out restaurant, normally indians can be quite dark and dingy, but this was bright and with character. The only initial thought was that the table was very small. Now I know this is a common problem with indian restaurants, lots of dishes come and not enough room on the table. But even with us just sitting there I had to almost sit on the end to make sure i could move my elbows.

The menu was refreshingly different, there were lots of dishes I have never heard of or tried before, but I guess that is the Bangladesh influence. The menu wasn't great at explaining what some of the dishes were for example "Paprika Special" that was all it said, no clue to anything else.  Also a real good price range from £4 to £525 for a starter, I wonder how many people order that one. Also if I said Paprika mixed grill starter, what would you expect? I bet it is not what I got.

Starter: Paprika Mixed Grill

Well was it what you expected? Presented well and I must admit I was curious to try it. Well I tried the scotch egg looking thing and although crispy I have no idea what was inside, animal vegetable or mineral, but it was ok. Then the chicken breast, this was well cooked and tender, but not sure if it had any other taste other than chicken. Then the wrap, I could be right I could be wrong but I think this was a duck wrap, this was very tasty but again lacked any real spice. Overall starter wise although cooked and presented well I was disappointed. I am just glad it was a menu error and it as £5.25 rather than £525

 

Main Course: King Prawn Madras (pronounced mad-ar-se), Pilau Rice, Garlic and Chilli Nan and a stolen portion of Mick's Sag Paneer

Rice was excellent nice and fluffy, the King Prawns in the Madras were clearly fresh and cooked well, nice and tender but with a bite to them. The madras sauce was how I like it started mild and built in heat throughout the course and didn't just blow your head off at the start spoiling the rest of the meal. The Sag Paneer was also very tasty, the nice part being that the paneer had not turned to rubber like it does in some restaurants. Lastly the Nan was not only presented well, but was superb a nice crispy base without being burnt, and puffy air bubbles in the bread itself. Overall the second course was superb and worth the 30 min wait since the starter (although borderline).

Pudding: Guess - yes indeed that horrible generic frozen sorbet in a fruit selection. So settled for a hot towel  and an After Eight.
Overall I had a good meal I put the starter down to personal taste, and the main course and side dishes was great. The staff were pleasant, but ultimately the service was terrible, but only from a time perspective, again a good 15 - 20mins wait for the bill ad the place was empty.
The cost worked out at approx £30 per head including 2 beers. I would go back to see if the service was a one of as the food was good.

Venue/service 2/5
Food 4/5
Value for money 3/5

Mick's Review

The venue was very spacious with ample leg room at each table, nicely decorated and and nice atmosphere.

Starter - Nazakat (pronounced Nazi-Cat)

Tandoori skewered chicken grilled and delicately spiced and succulent - I was slightly disappointed with this starter, as although nicely presented there was not much taste of the spice/s, as I was looking forward to having my taste buds spiced up.

Main Meal - King Prawn Jalfrez

Now this was more like it, nicely presently along with pilau rice and a garlic nan - this was a very nice meal Prawn's were large and tasteful, pilau rice was cooked right and was light and tasty, the garlic nan was cut into triangles ( all that was missing was my high chair - ha ha).
The Jalfrazi was very tasteful and very spicy (just recently got into the (spice/s) and found this meal enjoyable, it left a nice spicy taste in the mouth and was not too over spiced

Venue/service - 3/5
Food - 3.5/5
Value for money 2.5 /5

Harry's Review

We were all I think well up for our first Indian for review. Paprika is on Nightingale road and is a sit down/takeaway, I have used Paprika before, but not for best part of two years. On my previous visits I wasn’t that impressed with the food, so didn’t know what to expect tonight. I was pleasantly surprised by the interior it has a smart, clean and contemporary feel and definitely improved since my last visit. There were four of us tonight with our guest reviewer and we had booked a table for four – it did feel a bit cramped for space on our table, though not a major problem.

We launched into some poppadums whilst we perused the menu. The relishes were good with raita, mango chutney, onion and spicy lime pickle. The menu does contain some interesting choices that I haven’t seen in other Indians, as well as the choice of “traditional” dishes.

For starter I went for the Jhinga Garlic, skewered and tandoori grilled king prawns. The dish came up with two very generously sized king prawns and a salad accompaniment. For a starter this was just about the right volume of food, the king prawns were very nice, though perhaps could have been spiced a tad more heavily. I really didn’t get much flavour of any marinade.

For main I plumped for the Suhagi chicken with pilau rice and a sag bhaji side dish. The rice portion was generous and the spinach in the bhaji cooked nicely, not the green mush you sometimes get. The Suhagi was described as chicken cooked with green peppers, shallots, lemon grass and fennel. I can’t say that I was able to distinguish the individual ingredients above, but the overall taste of the dish was delicious with a rich flavor to start that gave a slow but not unpleasant build up of heat after a few minutes of eating.

I'm not generally too concerned about dessert in an Indian restaurant so wasn't particularly bothered that they were only offering the standard pre-packaged freezer stuff which we all passed on.

Overall I was quite impressed. The food has definitely improved since my last visit. Service was a little slow, but I think that this is a reflection of the freshly cooked dishes, something that I would prefer to the McDonalds curry type approach in some other places. The food was approx. £20 per head and beers ~£4 a go, I went for the Bangla bottled beer at 660 ml and 5% not bad value for money. Fours across the board from me, would have been higher on the food if the starter had a bit more oomph.

Food 4
Venue/Service 4
Value for Money 4

Guest Review: Paprika, 27 Nightingale Road

Guest Review Score

They say that first impressions last, so come on chaps, sort this out please. By my reckoning it’s not been daddy long legs season for at least six months, so why not remove the dead one that’s squashed between your menu and the front window? It’s not a good look.

When you walk into Paprika you’re presented with a décor that’s shall we say, interesting. Part 1970s Habitat, part Prisoner Cell Block H. It makes a change from the standard Indian restaurant look, and actually isn’t unpleasant. The tables could do with being a bit larger though.

On to the important bit, the food! The menu is very interesting, lots of dishes I’ve never seen before, and not much sign of the typical Indian restaurant fare, which is mostly limited to the back of the menu.

Now it has to be said when ordering starter in a curry house, I’m more than a little predictable. That’s because I only ever order one starter, Chicken Chaat. It’s not that I don’t like anything else, I just love Chicken Chaat! This was a good one. Oodles of coriander, lovely moist chicken and just the right amount of spice; all served on a nice soft puri. A good size too, not to big, not too small, which I liked because Indian food can be extremely filling. Indian food is always difficult to present nicely, but this was, it’s amazing what difference an unusual plate and a masterchef style squiggle of sauce can make. The downside? It took friggin ages to arrive, now I don’t mind waiting for my food to be cooked, but it was over half an hour by my reckoning. The restaurant wasn’t especially busy either.

Onto mains, and I plumped for the intriguingly entitled “Paprika Special”, of which the menu contains precisely zero information beyond the price. When it eventually arrived, by now around an hour after we first ordered, it turned out to be a rather nice dish. Two (whole) chicken breast fillets, stuffed with minced lamb in a tomatoey, hot and sour sauce. The chicken was good and moist, though perhaps lacking in that essential chilli kick for me. Also (and I’m spotting a pattern here) it had loads of fresh coriander again. I love coriander, so I was more than happy, but if you’re one of those peculiar people who does not, you might want to ask them to go easy. Sadly I got a really rubbish picture, it looked much better than this in real life, honestly. With my “Paprika Special” I had nice and simple plain rice, it was well cooked, there’s not much more that can be said about plain rice. I did however pinch a bit of Maurice’s Garlic & Chilli Naan, which was pretty great.

Next, dessert. Ah yes, the Indian Restaurant dessert menu... Is there anything more tempting to behold than the “Eggman”, “Funky Pie” or a Kulfi served in a Screwball container left over from the 80s but missing its gobstopper? All served at -20ºC and harder than Jimmy Saville’s cock in a children’s home. No thanks. I won’t mark Paprika down for it, because they’re no different to every other Indian restaurant out there. But please, please could somebody who is running an Indian restaurant out there be a bit more imaginative with your puds?

Overall I liked Paprika, and in a town with basically no good Indian restaurants it stands out; although I would say there are better places to find just a few miles outside Hitchin.

Service and venue: 2/5
Food and drink: 3.5/5
Value for money: 3/5
Overall: 3/5

The Three Moorhens, Hitchin Hill

Team Rating

Harry's Review

So up to the Three Moorhens for our next food session. Not a pub that I have used very much so didn’t know what to expect. The place is a bit TARDIS like in that it looks small from the outside, but is really quite spacious on the inside. Again a Greene King house. Maurice arrived a few mins before Mick and myself and was struggling to get served at the bar. Staff were covering both the food and bar sales and service was slow.

The pub is done out well with a traditional theme and has a comfy feel. There is ample seating outside and I could imagine it being very busy on a warm summer weekend

Got a pint of IPA, good value at £2.59 a pint and a good pint in itself. We found a table and perched ourselves there. Service it is fair to say was sporadic. There didn’t seem to be enough staff working, so when we were asked if we were ready to order, we asked for 5 minutes and it was more like 20 mins and then a different waitress.

None of us wanted starters, so it was straight into the mains. I went for the lamb shank as this one of my faves and success! It was on. However I did get asked by the waitress if I wanted seasonal veg with that, not realising that was an extra dish I said yes, given that the lamb shank already came with peas, probably not necessary! When the dish came up to add insult to injury, the kitchen had run out of broccoli, so to add to the carrot and cauli in the veg side dish they gave extra peas. So a bit of a pea fest… The dish came up with the lamb shank on a bed of mash, a bit of gravy, peas and a small jug of mint sauce. The veg was average, there were far too many peas, the mash OK and not enough gravy. However the lamb shank was a triumph. Beautifully cooked and a good size, there was a generous amount of tender lamb which fell off the bone.

For pud I went for the easy option of the trio of ice cream – just what I fancied at the time. It was very nice and a generous portion, which I also noticed for the other puds for Maurice and Mick, you certainly couldn’t complain about the dessert portions. We did wait a long time for the desserts to arrive, so much so that Maurice was on the edge of having a sense of humour failure.

In summary the food was middle range pub grub, done OK but spoiled a bit by slow service. From looking at the menu, there are good deals to be had on certain nights. For my meal today I would say fairly average across the board, the lamb shank was great but balanced out by not great veg and slow service.
Service and venue: 3/5
Food and drink: 3/5
Value for money: 3/5

Maurice's Review

It has been a long time since I have been to the Moorhens at least 10 years I would say, so not sure what to expect. All I know is last time I went I had a falling out with the waiter because I ordered a Caesar salad and it came with tomatoes, cucumber and mixed leaves. That's a salad not a Caesar salad. Oh sugar I just realised I still haven't let go!!!!

Anyway on arrival I was shocked to find how many chairs were outside, if this was on a beech in spain woohooo but not sure how they handle the good old British weather. The inside had been redecorated to a high standards and I was hopeful it was going to be a good night.

Anyway that's where the fun ended for me, I was stood at the bar for approx 15 min before being served. The reason for this is that there was only 1 bar staff on, and they were also handling all the food orders. However when I asked if they were busy the answer was "no more than normal".

The good news however was its a cheap round so an extra point by the other boys I am sure.

Starters: Nothing really caught my eye on this, not sure why they had enough range.

Main: Hunters Chicken

This has become a regular in pubs I think, basically a chicken breasts, with bacon on the top, bbq sauce and melted cheese. This came with good old chips and a salad. Overall not a bad dish, only comment I would make is that the chicken was very dry, and a little on the small side, but overall for a pub food - not bad.

Pudding: Apple Crumble and Cream

At first arrival the pudding looked huge, and indeed it was a heck of a portion. The crumble top was lovely and thick and sugary. The apple was sweet and just soft enough not to be mushy. The heat was perfect and didn't burn the mouth. Overall the highlight of the night.


Summary:
Apart from the exceptionally slow service from the point of the first pint to the point of almost cancelling my order for pudding after such a wait, this wasn't bad. It was your typical pub food, Goldilocks would be happy as it wasn't great and it wasn't awful it was just right.

Service and venue: 3/5
Food and drink: 3/5
Value for money: 3/5

Mick's Review

Arrived to hear that Maurice had been told that it was not too busy by the bar staff, oh good I thought this should be good, oh how wrong could I have been, it took Maurice a good 10 minutes to get served ( not bad for a pub that was - not too busy).

We sat down and ordered our meals my main meal was - Gammon and chips with double egg and peas, the staff friendly and helpful, the meal arrived, nice and hot and very tasty. I must admit I was rather surprised as I was not expecting this, but sadly it went downhill from there.

I noticed that 3 ladies arrived and sat at a table close by, and ordered their drinks and they duly arrived, when we had finished our main meals, we ordered dessert, in the meantime the table with the 3 ladies had received their main meals and had also received a second round of drinks, before our food arrived.

We waited 10 minutes for our dessert, still nothing arrived, no explanation from the staff and I mentioned to Harry and Maurice that I thought we were now one waitress down. 15 minutes later Maurice is getting more that agitated that we had still not received our desserts, and was extremely close in cancelling his dessert order, just as that decision was about to be made all our desserts turned up ( and not before time). For my dessert I ordered the sticky toffee pudding, which was very nice and very tasty, but due to the delay in receiving the dessert I felt this let the place down, very disappointed as it had started out very well indeed.


Service and venue: 2/5
Food and drink: 3/5
Value for money: 2.5/5