EatNottingham.com

One man's epic quest to eat at every decent restaurant in the English City of Nottingham.

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Name: Nottingham Diner
Location: Nottingham, The East Midlands, United Kingdom

Sunday, September 30, 2007

Kayal

I haven't written anything for ages because, well, nothing has happenned. I got a bit bored of going to the same places over and over again and writing about how great they were. But behold! My cup runneth over. There is a new show in town.


Today we went to sample the Nottingham Tram Walk. This involves riding the tram to Hucknall and then walking through deprived, gun-ridden and chav-infested Bestwood Village to the otherwise idyllic Bestwood Park and Big Wood. The journey on the tram from Nottinham station was by stages exciting, almost European, impressive, then suddenly bleak and then increasingly depressing and ultimately frightening. Hucknall is the end of the line allright.


Returning to civilisation I felt in need of a drink and we went to the Broadway cafe bar to have one. I was brought up short by a new restaurant on Broad Street offering the cuisine of Southern India, specifically Kerala.

Kayal has been open a month and is still in the phase of youthful idealism which invariably precedes a steady decline into complacency or profiteering. The interior decor is a disaster area (think Swedish sauna crossed with miners welfare club) but the food was excellent.

I had a Thali (it goes by some other name at Kayal) which was truly superb, particularly in the vegetarian options. The variety was excellent and I didn't recognise a single thing on the menu - you will search in vain for Chicken Tikka Masala and all that rubbish, it's all authentic stuff from India's lesser known south.

The prices are utterly ludicrous and I fail to see how they can sustain them at these levels. It has got to be the cheapest good quality city centre restaurant there is. We paid £35 for two, with a bottle of wine and were more than satisfied. An outstanding debut - let's hope that they can keep it up.