As I’m sure many of you curry lovers know, well over 2000 (my personal estimate…) spice seekers and curry fanatics flocked to London’s East End for the 10th annual Cobra Brick Lane Curry Festival.
A number of Brick Lane’s restaurants gave away free curry samples against a back drop of Bollywood dancing and live music, to celebrate the vibrancy of Asian culture and cuisine.
The restaurants that took part were as fantastic and diverse as all the curry houses on Brick lane and I took great pleasure in sampling the lot – all washed down with an ice cold Cobra beer of course!!
I could rattle on for hours about how much fun I had and how good the food was but I think you should check out the photos below to get an idea for yourself!
So what do you think? If you could start a Curry Festival in your area what would be the top 5 curry houses in your area?
The Cobra Brick Lane Curry Festival is renowned for being one of the country’s largest and most spectacular street parties, and regularly attracts more than 60,000 curry fans.
Tags: Bollywood, Brick Lane, Brick Lane Festival, Cobra, curry, Dr Spice, London, restaurant
Posted in Restaurants |
Curries in India are invariably jam-packed with fresh vegetables and spices. In fact India has one of the largest vegetarian populations in the world – approximately 40% are vegetarian compared to only around 6% in the UK.
With this in mind and now that the snow has gone and spring is slowly appearing I thought it was a good time to try a new experiment. Although I don’t have a garden there’s no reason why I can’t attempt to grow my own chillies for all my curries. After all, they don’t take up much space and will grow quite happily in a pot by the window.
I’m not afraid to admit I’m a complete novice when it comes to gardening – let alone growing chillies – so I thought I’d check out top chilli blog Chilli Up North for some hot tips.
Andy has broken down the growing process into three simple steps so hopefully even a gardening beginner, like me, should be able to grow something!
1. Growing Chillis Part 1: Getting Started
2. Growing Chillis Part 2: Germination
3. Growing Chillis Part 3: Potting on/Transplanting
I completed the first step yesterday with my Aji Rojo Chilli seeds and am working on step 2 over the rest of the week – fingers crossed it works out ok. I’ll be giving you all regular updates when it all starts growing and, of course, how they taste!
Do you want to have a go at planting some chillies? I’ve got 50 packets of seeds to give away. The first 50 people to email me with your name and address will be sent a packet of seeds to get you started completely free!
Wow! All 50 packs have gone already I’m afraid – thanks to those who entered – they’ll be with you soon! Don’t forget to email your photos in as well and we’ll upload the best ones onto the Facebook page.
Tags: Aji Rojo, Chilli, Chilli growing, Chilli Seeds, Cobra, curry, Dr Spice, Facebook, ingredients
Posted in Uncategorized |
You are probably in the midst of Christmas party season with the usual, predictable trappings of plastic mistletoe, mulled wine that’s far too sweet and bone dry Turkey.
Here at Cobra we like to do things a little differently, so for our Christmas party we decided to go for a “Curry Safari” along London’s legendary Brick Lane.
Curry Safari? Well the idea is that you go to three different restaurants for each course – starter, main, and of course, desert.
In our trip we went to the following truly excellent restaurants (the best on Brick lane in my opinion):
I’m not going to give a run-down of exactly what we ate in each (mainly because there was so much it’s impossible to remember it all!) but instead will give you some top-tips for your own Curry Safari
- Go with a decent sized group – there were 10 in our group which was an ideal number. It meant we could swap seats at each restaurant and sit next to different people
- Phone ahead and tell the restaurants what you’re doing – they really don’t mind if you let them know in advance (I also think they secretly love the competition!)
- When ordering ask the restaurant what they’d recommend – unless you’re an expert/allergic to something/hardcore vegan they’ll know what will work better than you will – and get a selection of food to share
- Experiment! – try something new, what a great excuse to try a Phaal (oh go on), or a Paratha
- Wash it all down with a Cobra of course ‘tis the season to be jolly after all!
Hope you all have a great Christmas party season and don’t forget to drink responsibly
P.S. Big thanks to Poppadom, Moon Light, and City Spice for accommodating us on the night
Tags: Brick Lane, Christmas Party, Cobra, curry, Curry Safari, Dr Spice
Posted in Restaurants |
