Rice & 3 - chickpeas, lamb & chicken
October 2011
Formerly Tastemaster's, delhi2go has arisen in the same spot with some of the same staff. Appearance-wise it's from another era. Gone are the grime and hand-written, star-shaped, luminous signs. In their place are fancy new printed signs and menus, stark walls and splashes of colour (greeny yellow). It's about as much as I've ever seen a curry cafe look like a modern sandwich shop. Do I care? No.One genuine addition is that there are curries and rice in containers, at the front - ready '2 go', so to speak. This is a big improvement - seeing the dishes is a big part of the experience in rice & 3 type places and food mysteriously appearing from the back doesn't inspire confidence. So far, so good. As a first visit Rice&3 seemed the logical choice - especially since there was no sign of the other advertised dishes - no ready marinaded kebab skewers in the chiller, for instance. The current offer is rice or naan and 3 curries for an introductory price of £3.95, apparently going up to £4.20 at some point.
I'll cut to the chase - the main disappointment was the portion size, a small quantity of rice was put on one side of the plate - rather than covering it, which occurs everywhere else. This was followed by spoonfuls of mostly sauce being poured into the rest of the dish. And when I say mostly sauce I mean it - surely chickpeas aren't such a valuable commodity that a portion has to be restricted to approximately five individual peas? The other issue was that the curry sauces all mingled, with no rice to block their progress – making it difficult to distinguish any individual flavours. This was one of those unique occasions with very little filler or killer. In fact possibly the smallest rice&3 I've ever had. Now - the flavours were good. The principle ingredients of the 3 curries were all well cooked and the rice was fluffy and tasty, with hints of clove and cardamom. So is the complaint really that I'm a greedy git? - Possibly. But I stand by that. If you've got £4 for a curry-like snack this isn't a bad option, I can't see it being destination of choice for me though.
A slight aside is that delhi2go professes to do healthier food – look at the photo. Plenty of oil. I don’t personally care and accept it as part of the gig but don’t quite understand why places make these declarations and then do nothing about them.
