Mumtaz, Bradford

I might just be falling out of love with Mumtaz. I’ve been a big fan since my first visit to the original Bradford restaurant 7 or 8 years ago, and have never been disappointed with a meal there or in the Leeds branch.

Not everything they produce is quite so good though. The supermarket ready meals are a mixed bag (although still better than virtually all the store own branded versions) and I’ve had poor food from the Jaldi Jaldi takeaway outlets. There were just a few signs in our Bradford meal over the weekend that all might not be well in mothership of the empire either.

That’s not to say we weren’t well fed though. Some things were very good, like they always have been. The pickle tray has always been a cut above, and still is. The tamarind chutney is gooey and tangy and lovely, there are two varieties of raita both made with proper, thick yoghurt and the lime pickle is fierce. What the hell the cheap pitted black olives are doing there I have no idea but I’m willing to overlook them as a foolish mistake.

A piece of chicken tikka on the bone was even hotter than the lime pickle, surprising but not in a bad way. The heat was tempered by lovely bits of charred marinade, singing with ginger, encasing still tender meat.

It was the curries that let the side down a bit. Both a karahi lamb and a karahi channa tasted a bit mass-produced, a bit like commodity curries made in bulk from a base paste. I could be completely wide of the mark but I have a sneaking suspicion they pre-cook everything in the same kitchen that supplies those ready meals and takeaways.

If I’m right then they still scrub up well after being fried in a good splash of ghee with extra ginger, garlic and coriander. I was merrily scooping away with my roti for ages. Something was slightly lacking though, they didn’t have that vibrancy and depth of flavour I seem to recall from visits past.

Back to the usual high standard with the bread though, each tandoori roti costing 85p a pop was thin, beautifully crisped and absolutely bloody enormous. They know how to cook rice too.

I haven’t fallen out of love with Mumtaz yet, and I hope they don’t give me cause to. A visit here is always a pleasure, the huge, bling, marble clad restaurant is an experience in itself and I like the atmosphere, lively with the chatter of families rather than the clatter of the booze-fuelled. That lack of booze also makes it nigh on impossible to spend over fifteen quid a head. We paid £28 including a tip. 

7/10

Great Horton Road

Bradford

BD7 3HS

www.mumtaz.co.uk

Lagos Spike, Manchester

Hidden down a dingy back alley off Chapel Street Manchester's worst kept secret has recently opened, the exuberant hovel of iniquity that is Lagos Spike.

Shivering from the autumn chill, I'm welcomed in from the street by Jeb Jepson, the elegantly coiffured front of house guy, one of three people running the show here, alongside business partners Tarquin Micklethwaite and Rose Rose-Gidley.

Jeb shows me to the bar, a solid, muscular presence in the room, brightly illuminated in intermittent circles by enormous filament bulbs hanging overhead. It's constructed, he tells me, entirely from pig iron reclaimed from spinning looms. It's a nod to the area's industrial past and in keeping with the ethos of the place that he proceeds to expound on.

Not before the drinks duly arrive though. I start with the excellent house white, a Pinot Grigio from the concise, no choice list where it's described in amusingly forthright manner as 'Fucking Wine'. It arrives in a distressed tumbler, a continuation of the post-industrial theme.

'There's a burgeoning movement here in the Western Quarter', Jeb tells me, 'the area has come on in  leaps and bounds since the renaming last year. Past associations with decline have been superseded by a truly vibrant urban renaissance. We really wanted to reflect that rebirth, but to keep things grounded in the history of the place we wanted a warts and all establishment, somewhere the local creatives can get down and dirty with the local locals, kick back and enjoy great food and booze without the formality. It's dining without the frippery, the reservations and starched table linen stripped out and pared down so we can focus on what's really important to our guests'.

It's clearly working, as the hour long queue outside in the drizzle attests, the democratisation of dining drawing in the crowds from across the city. Once inside, the place has a joyous buzz, twenty-somethings flitting about in the shadows, perching on Supermalt crates and making merry on recovered foam mattresses.

So what about the food, that's why I'm really here of course. 'We're bringing something new to the scene', Jeb proceeds, 'dishes the likes of which have never been seen in this town before. Eats that will blow your mind. The emphasis is on local produce, cooked with ingenuity. African food is so hot right now, and we really feel the polygamic marriage between the originality of Nigerian cuisine, the technique and classic dishes of Mexican street food and the produce of Lancashire has yet to be fully exploited, so that's what we're aiming to do'.

A selection of dishes from this Afro-Mex fusion tapas menu soon arrive, and boy are they good. The highlight for me is the bury plack pudding taco with hot shito, a dish whose fame has spread so rapidly it's already the stuff of legend in foodie circles. The artisan cornmeal tortillas act as the perfect vessel for the dense, porky goodness of the black pudding morsels within, the hot shito adding a brow-mopping hit of pure chilli heat. Totally dirty and utterly delicious.

Second prize for next best dish of the night went to the peanut butter burrito slider, a splendidly sloppy confection of rare breed (from Longhorn cattle farmed in nearby Monton apparently) rare beef chilli doused in extra spicy Ghanaian peanut sauce and held together in a slightly sweet brioche bun. Genius. Salivating genius.

Also commendable were the chipotle fufu fries, strips of deep-fried mashed yam doused in a smoky Mexican relish. By this time I was also gasping for more booze, and refreshment in general. Although the wine list is brief beer features more extensively. They have a huge range of imported craft beers all served with care in elegant stemware. I enjoyed an absolute belter of a triple-hopped imperial mild from Guam, sadly the name of the brewery escapes me.

Desserts are a more straightforward affair than the savoury dishes, a short list is split into very small plates, small plates, and less small plates to share. Being pretty much full up on dirty meaty filth I ordered the quarter of an Eccles cake from the very small plates section and was presented with a quarter of an Eccles cake on a wooden board. Simple, wonderful food with no need for prissy decoration.

Thereon the night progressed into a slightly drunken haze of meaty treats, strong booze and beats. After beers we moved onto the extensive cocktail list, the standout mix for me being the Aperol vimto spritz.

It's for that reason my photos are so terrible (apologies), that and the fact that there are no lights anywhere other than at the bar. 'It suits the vibe', Jeb explains, 'which if we're getting things right should be one part Dickensian workhouse to two parts West African stout den to one part illicit bookmakers in Gorton'.

Lagos Spike is undoubtedly one of the finest places to eat and drink in the north. The drinks are strong and applied liberally, the innovative fusion-filth food will tempt any budding gastronaut and the atmosphere rocks. As recently as five years ago this place just couldn't have existed in these parts, maybe in London's east end, but not in the north. See how far we've come.

9/10


off Chapel Street
The Western Quarter
Manchester
M3 5FF

No website, no reservations, no bullshit.

I was invited to review Lagos Spike.

Good things to eat [Volume 12]

Here are a few more things I've been eating lately, including some particularly fine bread and cheese that's worth seeking out.

Ogleshield cheese

Let's kick things off with the cheese. Ogleshield is a washed rind cow's cheese, and it's an absolute bobby-dazzler. It's got that penetrating, lasting intensity of flavour you only get from cheese made with unpasteurised milk. Very smooth and quite dense in texture, it melts slowly on the tongue releasing wave after wave of tangy, almost wine-like flavour.

I've eaten it with apples, on bread and toast, and grated into a mushroom risotto as an adjunct to the parmesan. Every which way was a winner.

A quick google search told me that it's made by the Montgomery family in Somerset, the same people who make my beloved Montgomery's cheddar. I have no doubt that they are among the finest cheese makers in the land. Marvellous stuff.

The Lincolnshire Poacher stall at Sharrowvale market sells Ogleshield, as will any Neal's Yard Dairy stockist. If you're in the North-West (or Ilkley) give Booth's a try.

http://www.nealsyarddairy.co.uk/cheeses/Ogleshield.pdf

http://www.lincolnshirepoachercheese.com/


Sabra Hummous

I finally found a good brand of hummous that's readily available in the supermarket. Spend any time in the Middle East and British supermarket hummous will forever be a disappointment. But it's just mashed up chickpeas, oil and tahini you say. No, no, no. The really good stuff is smooth and light, and lemony and nutty, and delicious and really, really bloody more-ish. The rubbish stuff is dull and dense and grainy and boring.

You can get this in Sainsbury's and while it's not absolutely top notch it's a far better effort than the norm. Having looked at the ingredients I think the key to good hummous is probably more tahini and oil, and fewer chickpeas. We all know fat equals flavour after all.


Seven Hills Bakery bread

Alongside the aforementioned cheese, bread from the Seven Hills Bakery stall was the best thing I bought at the Sharrowvale market on Sunday. A quick word on the market: it's excellent, with a good range of stalls on the food front (cheese, meat and especially cakes are well represented) covering all bases the only exception being a complete lack of fruit and veg. It was busy without being overbearing and the atmosphere was fantastic. Highly recommended.

Seven Hills Bakery have a shop on Sharrow Vale Road, but also set up a stall out front on market days. Their Sharrow sourdough is the best bread I've eaten in ages. I can't find the words to describe precisely what makes it so good, it's just got that magical combination of taste and texture. You'll have to try it for yourself to see what I mean. It's pictured at the top of the post with the cheese, and above, toasted with my porky beans.

Although way past its best for eating as it is, five days on it's still toasting beautifully. I will be back for more.

376 Sharrow Vale Road, Sheffield
http://www.sevenhillsbakery.co.uk/


Watkins Mushroom Ketchup

I'd like to continue the Sheffield love-in here and talk about Henderson's relish, but the truth is I'm not a big fan of the stuff. It's touted locally as some sort of magical elixir, a wonder condiment far superior to Worcestershire sauce to be applied liberally on all manner of foodstuffs. Sorry, to me it's the other way round, Henderson's just tastes like a crapper version of Lea and Perrin's.

A new and exciting sauce I have discovered however is mushroom ketchup, which is rather like a super-mushroomy Worcestershire sauce. Adding fungal depth to whatever you put it in (having just read what I've written I'm not sure 'fungal depth' is really an appropriate descriptive, but never mind) I really like this stuff. So far it's gone in a mushroom risotto and the porky beans I've just had for tea. There will be many more uses for it.

Widely available in supermarkets.

Chappati Corner, Cheetham Hill, Manchester

The cheap and cheerful theme is continuing round here at the moment, I've not been out for a meal costing more than a tenner in weeks. I had to travel from Salford up to Oldham a few days ago, and with only six quid on me and a large appetite a curry café visit en route through Manchester was inevitable.

Chapatti Corner is one of several on the Cheetham Hill Road strip, none of which I'm familiar with.  Selected completely at random it did the job with aplomb. A colossal portion, reasonably distinctive curries (far better than the beige slop appearance would suggest) of which the chickpeas were the best and added zip from a generous topping of ginger, coriander and chilli.

Given the name of the place I had to order a chapati on the side, anyone hanging the name of their restaurant on one particular foodstuff ought to make sure they do it well. Thankfully they did. The bread was the best thing about the meal, big, light and crisp, probably the best bread I've had in a curry caff and a bargain at 50p.

I was charged a fiver for rice and three curries, less than the £5.80 advertised on the menu, and handy given I needed my spare quid for that chapati. Cheap, satisfying food in a grubby caff, cricket in Urdu on the telly. That's how they roll in Cheetham Hill.

6/10

Chappati Corner
Cheetham Hill Road
Manchester

Bacon Sandwich Quest: September

It's that time again. Here's what you've all been waiting for, the nervous tension reaching a climax, the anticipation almost unbearable as you hit refresh with ever increasing frequency, sweaty palmed at what porky joys await.

I'll try to let you down gently. Most of September's pig related fun came in the form of Spanish jamon, British bacon appearing on my menu just the once in a spectacularly underwhelming effort from the Breadbox kiosk in Manchester Piccadilly station.

It didn't cost much (£2 or £2.50 including a tea?), but that's where the compliments end. It's one of those places where the breakfast butties are pre-made, then reheated in some sort of industrial megamicrowave grill machine that zaps the shit out of them in mere seconds, somehow rendering the bacon fiercely hot yet limp and flabby, and the bread damp inside but dry out. There's a reason microwaves with grill functions never took off.

That ought to be your lot, but I did say I'd let you down gently, so just for the hell of it here's October's first entry. I ate it at lunchtime on the first so it wasn't far off September.

This was better, a £2.20 large from our Gert's cafe in Walkley, Sheffield. A good soft roll harboured three rashers of sturdy, rough hewn bacon. The cooking was a touch irregular, some bits crispier than others, but other than that a solid effort. The chap serving was friendly, but he didn't offer me any sauce. No sauce! What is the world coming to.

Three more months and the ordeal will be over. It's becoming increasingly clear from the leaderboard that most bacon sandwiches are mediocre, and you'd be better making your own. Ho hum.

Trafalgar Fisheries, Wadsley Bridge, Sheffield

And so it goes, that a pleasant surprise is followed by a thoroughly unpleasant one.

I really wanted to like this place, it had the air of a classic back streets chippy. The staff were friendly, there was a steady stream of custom and free Ben Shaw's pop was on offer with larger orders. So far so good. A six week chippy hiatus had me salivating.

It's just a shame the fish and chips were dire. A lumpen, ossified shroud of batter enveloped the fish, the flesh within fragmented on impact into dry shreds, the only thing holding it together the still-on skin. A vague whiff of tinned tuna hung in the air. This was haddock, allegedly. Whatever it was it had been fried an age ago, and caught back in the mists of time.

Those eating cod fared better, but not much as far as I could tell. Chips were ok if underdone, and the only real redeeming feature were peas with a pleasingly sloppy consistency.

I'm awarding a bonus point for the peas and the free pop. It didn't cost much but you'd have to pay me to eat fish like that again. Don't bother.

3/10

Trafalgar Fisheries
17 Trafalgar Road
Wadsley Bridge
Sheffield
S6 1JY

Rowsha, Walkley, Sheffield

I haven't eaten out much over the last few weeks, at least not in the evenings in a restaurant with a bottle of wine sense. A few takeaways and a few quick lunches has been about it, but that's not to say I haven't eaten any good food.

A randomly chosen takeaway last weekend was a really pleasant surprise. Rowsha is a little Lebanese restaurant in Walkley with a very reasonably priced takeaway menu. All sorts of mezzes, hot and cold, can be had for less than four quid and kebab wraps are just three pounds each.

The fattoush was a match for those I ate in the Middle East last year, bright and fresh, the veggies tart with sumac and the bread properly crisped. An absolute bargain at three quid for a large container full.

Falafel and shish taouk (grilled chicken) wraps were both well-made, with more fresh salad and thin, lemony hummous. The chicken was particularly good, beautifully moist with lovely smokey barbecued edges. The only down-side was slightly thick, dry bread.

An unexpected delight, simple food cooked really well. I'd love to return to dine in the restaurant at some point.


8/10

288 South Road
Walkley
Sheffield
S6 3TE