Burra Khana is located in the Hockley area of Notts and is where Red Dog Saloon still is. The owners have split the building in two, which I understand as the space is really big but the two restaurants are essentially in the same place which makes the whole thing a bit weird to be honest. There were people behind us eating tacos and BBQ food whilst we were eating a curry and at the end of the meal we were offered the dessert menu ‘from the other place’ which was super strange.
Usually I’d kick off my reviews and food-related blog features as a ‘Where to eat in Nottingham’ recommendation style post but I had trouble with this one. The food we ate was nice and I’ll get on to some stars of the show soon, but the overall experience wouldn’t have us rushing back. I said if I’d have received the food as a takeaway I would have said it was a really awesome takeaway and I would massively recommend but because it was in a restaurant it left me a bit cold, just like the plates we were given.
We were invited to review Burra Khana as we couldn’t attend the press launch a few weeks ago which was really generous offer and we did have a nice meal overall. I’ll kick off with some of the best bits that I really enjoyed. Overall, all of the food was really tasty. We tried the Lamb Boti which is cooked in the tandoor oven – this really was lovely and spicy and tender but for 4 small pieces of lamb for around £10, it’s quite expensive. Our next favourite was the Kati Roll with the chicken filling, these were possibly the best bit of the whole meal, kebab style chicken meat in a Indian bread wrap – these were amazing! The curry we tried was lovely too, paneer and spinach and it was full of flavour.
Some of the dishes we weren’t too keen on, or didn’t impress were the rice as I felt it didn’t have much jazz to it even though it had onions and pine nuts over the top. The cheese and onion bhajis were basically just onion bhajis so nothing different about them really and I’ve had better bhajis to be honest!
For dessert we tried the pistachio kulfi which was actually lovely and had such a strong pistachio flavour but, the dried rose petals on top and a strange stringy base made it all a bit strange. Another odd thing we had which, in all fairness the waitress told us was a love it or hate it thing were the Dahi Golgappa – a chatpata snack from Mumbai which are crispy puffed puris stuffed with potatoes, chickpeas & sweet, sour and spicy house chutneys but have a really strange texture when you bite into them as you have to put the whole thing in your mouth which is a bit unpleasant to be honest! Finally, I tried a cocktail that was very strong in terms of the vodka that was in it and just wasn’t to my personal taste but I think this was probably just me choosing something wrong.
Some other things that didn’t really enhance the experience was the fact that our waitress didn’t know any of the dishes on the menu so when we were asking for advice she couldn’t help us and didn’t really seem to want to, either. We also saw at least 6 different members of staff over our visit which is odd when you usually have a dedicated server which I find quite nice sometimes. As I mentioned earlier the plates we were given were cold which isn’t what I’d expect and there were water spots on a lot of the metal dishes which didn’t make them look very appealing. On Instagram they look super cool and street-foodie and bright and vibrant but in reality the restaurant experience isn’t like this and they have some nice dishes but the overall experience isn’t worth what the meal would have cost.
There isn’t anything different or good enough about Burra Khana to stop me going to a ‘normal’ curry house if I wanted Indian food and it’s not cool or street-food enough to take over from Mowgli who have really amazing dishes and seriously cool vibes and atmosphere for essentially the same overall idea. I wouldn’t say don’t go there because some of the dishes are really nice but the overall experience wouldn’t make me rush back.
