I don't find myself in Rusholme very often these days. It's odd, my other half is not into curry whatsoever but his father absolutely loves the stuff. Go figure. If I was ever to take the in-laws on a big tour of Manchester, we'd head straight to Rusholme with a bag of beer and munch some spicy delights.
My memories of more regular boozy dinners on the Curry Mile are not as you might expect. A good few years ago, socially, I hung out with many gentlemen. It was the result of being in a circle of friends via ex partners and what-not, thus there were generally few females lurking about and I was one of them. Now, some men simply see a curry as something to wolf down as fast as possible when you've had a skinful.
Others take it very, very seriously.
I was in a group where no less than three members claimed to be curry connoisseurs. It wasn't just that they were very critical of their Indian food when they ate out. They made the stuff at home. From SCRATCH. That is, they bought curry pastes (sometimes even forgoing the paste to gather all ingredients themselves), natural yoghurts, garam masala, tinned tomatoes... and they were very, VERY fussy. As in, my ex partner point blank refused to eat a Sharwoods, Asda or even Mardhur Jeffrey sauce from a jar. Yes, these were not boys to cook for. So when one of these males, also a militant vegetarian (in fact two of the three were militant vegetarians... am I spotting a pattern here?) said that his favourite spot on the Curry Mile was Tabak, I had David Copperfield-esque Great Expectations.
Tabak swiftly became one of my favourite spots alongside Lal Haweli, although I didn't think it quite compared to the latter at first. It's had very mixed reviews on the Curry Mile website, however one positive review was written by an actual Indian person, and I must confess I've seen many dining in Tabak. So if you're after authentic Indian cuisine this is probably your best bet. And it's a lot more subtle and lower on carbon emissions in the form of neon lights than a great deal of the others, which is probably a good thing.
If the militants, and Indian people, the best judges of all (remember what I told you about how my parents taught me to eat in ethnic restaurants? If people of that origin eat there, it must be good) eat there then it's definitely worth a try. It also has all the essentials of a great Curry Mile restaurant - bring your own booze, student and group discounts, and it also has a function room for hire as well as a buffet service with an all-you-can-eat policy. Now that'd be great for those lager-swilling revellers who like to fill up on poppadoms to sober up slightly. Perhaps not so great for the discerning 'curry experts' I dined with. read more