Occasion: Catch up
Party Size: 2
Overall Rating: **** Very Good
Date Visited: December 2012Price Per Person: £15ppn 2 courses approx
The Aagrah is a chain of restaurants specialising in Indian/Kashmiri cuisine with at least 5 dotted around West Yorkshire. I have been to the Chapel Allerton, Café Aagrah and Mid-Point venues and have not always found them to be consistent so this review will specifically focus on the Leeds City restaurant located on St Peters Square.
Ideally situated near to the West Yorkshire Playhouse and opposite The Wardrobe bar This is a great venue to have a pre or post theatre meal and still go on for drinks across the road.
The restaurant itself is quite large with a separate bar area, a main dining area and a separate room available for private hire. The furnishings are modern and classy with dark furniture, crystal chandeliers and high back chairs. This place is contemporary, classy and at the same time has a relaxed ambience. An ideal place to go with friends, work colleagues, a date or even for a celebration.
On arrival the manager is always the first to welcome you through the door, although he always dresses in a sharp suit he is very polite and friendly so don’t think this place is pretentious as it isn’t. Once seated you have a waiter for the evening and what I really like about this place is every time I have been I get the same guy in his chef whites’ wheel out the courses. He is always chatty and remembers a face. It makes the place feel like a local curry house but with the finishing touches of a restaurant.
Food wise there is an extensive choice at this Aagrah, with a buffet option priced at £12.95 on Mondays and Thursdays and a set menu available from £18ppn for a starter, main course and side dish. If you are ordering off the A la Carte menu then starters range from £2.50-£5.00, Main Courses from £6.50-£12.50 and sides average £2.50 for Rice/Nan etc. Aagrah have a great vegetarian menu with over 22 main dishes priced from £6.00. If you don’t like Indian cuisine then Aagrah do fantastic homemade chips and a small selection of British classics such as Scampi and Chicken priced at approx £9.
On my visit we ordered from the A la Carte menu a Chicken Achar and the Balti Keema Chilli to share, both dishes we requested to be “hot” and both were served with extra green chillies being added.
The Chicken Achar is priced at £8.50 and this is a great dish that is fresh and nicely spiced it is made with yoghurt giving it a light yet full flavour with a great lime tang, we really enjoyed this dish and there was plenty of chicken and the sauce was a good consistency.
The Balti Keema Chilli priced at £8.20 was our other dish of choice this is a very rich main and has a strong flavour from the mince meat. It is quite spicy as the lamb seems to absorb the spices/chilli well. Consistency wise this is quite thick and less saucy but goes well with chapattis. It is quite a salty dish but if you share it with the Chicken Achar it works really well as the freshness of the Achar cuts through the deep flavour of the Keema.
We ordered boiled rice at £2.40 and 2 chapattis at £0.90 to compliment our mains. The chapattis were a good size, fresh and served warm. The boiled rice was a generous portion and cooked perfectly - very fluffy! We also had a side dish of pink lentils called Dall Tarka priced at £3.50, again enough to share, nicely flavoured and a good texture. 
Portions wise there were plenty for 2 healthy appetites and if you are going to have extra sides (like we did) then there would be enough for a take out box.
Service wise the Aagrah are pitched perfect; they have a very friendly team that are welcoming and efficient. Everything runs like clockwork at this site, you never seem to be waiting long for drinks, main courses or the bill.
For a chain this restaurant seems to maintain its charm and I think is embedded in the ethos of the owner Mohammed Sabir MBE, who continues to run this as a family business with each outlet manager being a family member, so the passion runs through the business. I personally find this particular branch to be the most consistent on delivering quality of food and service so it is definitely one of my favourite curry houses in the Leeds city centre and for me they deserve to have won the British Curry Awards.
Other dishes I recommend trying here are the: Mangalore, Hyderabadi and the Goan Machli (Monkfish)
If you want to visit in the New Year then Aagrah have up to 25% off - just visit the website for more details:
Agree with this review 100%. I've visited all the Aagrah restaurants (except Bristol) and never had any cause for complaint at any of them.
ReplyDelete@steveb63live