Kebabish Original (Rusholme)

Photo is pre-refurbishment - it looks much smarter now

May 2010
It's been tarted up somewhat - the food looked good but it has gone flashier and become more like a restaurant. And hence too expensive (and slow) to fit in this blog. £5.90 for a chicken tikka kebab and £6.90 for lamb tikka is just too much - in the case of lamb tikka literally double the price of surrounding places. We were offered a table and a menu but declined, didn't order and left. - The food under the glass counter looked really good and making choices based on how it looks is all part of the experience - why steer the customer away from it to make a choice looking at a menu? On the other hand for a 'meal out' this might be OK, it's clean, bright etc etc - but these prices aren't sustainable for regular lunchtime trips and the associated delay caused by table servcice doesn't help either. Big parts of what's good about low-key kebab-type places are speed, reasonable prices and not relying on menus but seeing what's there on the day. K.O. doesn't have these things going for it and is clearly trying to be 'classier' but the added time and price are big negatives for us - perhaps the food is good - it looked fine, but I don't think we'll find out soon.

2008
This place is half way between a kebab house and a restaurant. It's large and has table service. The meat had been cooked before, and it was tough. The marinade was tasty. There are sauces and water on the tables - which was good. The music from the television was pretty loud and rather distracting - but plenty of places are like that. The kebabs are almost the most expensive (£5.30) and not worth the extra cost. The curries and mixed grill look good though.

Scores out of 10
Meat 6.5
Bread 7.5
Salad/Sauces 6.5
Service/Setting 7.0
Average 6.9