Curry in Camden, the battle of wet and dry

Curry. Umm curry. I like curry in my tummy, but only curry that does not make your bum runny. So, where to have curry in Camden?

Camden has a dearth of curry establishments, fine or not. Why this is, I do not know - presumably because it isn’t a traditionally South Asian community and therefore few businesses were established. In fact, I can only think of two Indian restaurants in Camden Town and one is a Masala Zone - a chain restaurant. This disappoints me muchly, especially as I used to live in East London and had Mirch Masala under my flat, and the world famous Lahore was across the world.

So can anything in the fine shire of NW1 compete? In short: no. There are three restaurants I shall discuss: Camden Maharani (on the High St), Masala Zone (Parkway) and Bangalore Brassiere (just off Camden road). The first and last are independent establishments and therefore preferable to a chain. The Maharani is nice inside, has good, friendly and efficient service, and serves very stylised curry. But perhaps this is where my issue with is resides - the food is a little too flashy; it just does not seem authentic enough. But on a scale on one to ten of Camden curry spots, I'd give it a seven.

Next up, Masala Zone. Despite the fact it is a chain, it does good curry. In fact, I recently had the butter chicken and it was comparable to a dish I had in Goa - and that is saying a lot. But where it lets itself down is with the dry dishes - starters, kebabs etc. They are just not good, they are bad. In comparison, Bangalore Brassiere is a master of kebabs, meat tikkas, samosas, but can not make a gravy dish to save its life. Well it can, but on a basis of multi-coloured paint that you could use to paint a badly coloured wall. This Indian restaurant is my local so I won't slate it; all I will say is don't go out of your way to visit it. Unless you want the 'traditional' UK curry experience i.e. somewhere that has not changed since 1970.

And so we come to the title of this email: can any Indian restaurant in Camden do both kebabs and gravy dishes to a high standard - as far as I can tell, the answer is no. Postcard responses please....

One last thing on this issue. I am launching my inaugural pub crawl this Saturday and had planned for Masala Zone to be the lunch spot. Here's what happened: I call them, I'm told that I can not reserve unless I have 10 or more people - no problem - I am super popular and hundreds will attend (not) - I am then told that a minimum of 90% of the reservation number must attend, order from a fixed menu starting at £14 per person, or else no booking can be made and I will be liable for the cost difference. The Pond thinks this is ridiculous. On a previous visit, I got annoyed with this restaurant and questioned their actual desire to sell food and make profit; the same thought springs to mind regarding reservations. So I shall book the Maharani and support local business - I should have done this in the first place.

One last thought on this issue - the Halal curry vendor in stables market is excellent for £5. But only wet and no dry. Shall I cry?