01706 825 702

I’m going to start this review with a little intro to our scoring/star system.  As historic readers of Restaurants of Manchester know, we score out of 5 and in 27 years nobody on our site has ever scored a 5, Michelin Starred or not!  That isn’t because we’re harsh scorers, it’s because we’re professionals with an educated point of reference and decades of assessment experience under our belts, so the only way to stay consistent is with a fact-based score card.   

You’ll see plenty of TripAdvisor and Google reviews dishing out 5 star reviews as freely as confetti, based purely upon an individual's enjoyment of their evening, but nothing else which is actually measured.  Yes, enjoyment is important and is indeed the main reason for eating out, but you need to look at the bigger picture and that's what we do.  So some of our scores may seem low compared to the more opinion led platforms, but that doesn’t equate to a 'bad' score, only that it takes into the whole experience into account on the same playing field as fancier places.

Anyway, with that out of the way, it's impossible to utter the word 'hospitality' these days without it being instantly hyphened alongside 'cost of living crisis'.  For me though, current costs are no longer a crisis, they are just normality, and crises inherently pass.  Because let's face it, when in the history of economics did living costs ever fall significantly?  The answer is never, so why now?  Things cost more for everyone to buy, yet consumers have less disposable cash so are even less likely to shell out.  Double whammy.  And whilst industry celebrities and self-promoting politicians repeatedly call for help in the form of highly unlikely VAT cuts, ultimately in my opinion another option for venues is to give customers more spending power in terms of good value deals.

Now, there's a little Indian Restaurant up in Holcombe Village, just on the Mcr side of the Gtr Mcr/Lancs border, called Mala.  Cards on table, I know Mala really well because I live about half a mile from it.  Over the years I've eaten in a handful of times and grabbed a takeaway on countless occasions, but ahead of this visit couldn't recall the last time that I visited despite always enjoying it.  It's just a reliably enjoyable, family run, old school curry house.

A few days before our visit (Monday Aug 10th), we spotted an ad on Mala's socials promoting 'Monday Madness', which gets you any starter (barring lamb chops and king prawns), any main course (same stipulations), and a rice or naan, for just £9.99; a price which defies logic.  I can't ever recall being able to get a dine-in starter/curry/side-carb for that little money, ever, anywhere apart from when I was actually in India, regardless of any ongoing crisis.  So, we booked in.

When we landed the owner/manager instantly recognised us, which considering that even after all this time he has no idea what we do for a living, is a yardstick of the genuine hospitality on offer here.  Every customer is treated like returning extended family.  The conversation quickly established that our last dine-in visit was almost 7 years prior, at which point a wave of embarrassment rightly hit us in the face.

We got stuck into the ordering and kept it simple with poppadoms/dips along with a few staple starters.  A couple of Cobras followed, as they tend to do, just ahead of our starters arriving. Meat Samosas could have been a bit bigger in size but they were rammed full of minced lamb and well balanced spicing.  Onion Bhajis however were as generous as they were enjoyable.  Tennis ball sized orbs, spiced expertly well and fried to a perfect crisp, yet cooked through with a nice light structure.  Exemplary work.

Both plates came dressed with the traditional curry house side salad and lemon wedge, which I'm sure nobody actually eats/it always goes in the bin?  It makes you wonder, if each dish's garnish costs a venue say just 10p, over  year much money is going in the bin?  I love an old school Indian, but maybe the ongoing 'crisis' can bear a few lessons in stripping back any unrequired and seemingly menial costs which over the year rack up.  Game over for pointless side salads IMO.

For mains we went with a Chicken Chilli Masala which is a spicy spin on the nation's supposed favourite.  The gravy was more red than any curry probably needs to be, but beyond the technicolour sat layers of flavour, smoky tandoor-cooked chicken breast and the expected chilli kick to balance off that creamy richness.  There was no mistaking the great flavour and generosity in chicken portioning.  Superb.

That £9.99 price tag encouraged us to order not only the non-included poppadoms and dips, but also a well-made Bombay Aloo, with perfectly cooked potatoes and a rich gravy.  We didn’t need it to be fair but at those prices the mindset is 'well why not'.  You're out, you're enjoying yourself, so for that moment in time forget that you largely visited for crazy the price tag and hence ironically yet very happily spend a bit more.

And that’s why such encouraging pricing is smart business as it brings that extra customer spending power to the forefront.  It gets bums on seats and then gives proficient servers the chance to discreetly and politely upsell.  Would you like poppadoms; yes please.  Can I get you any sides, the potatoes are delicious;  Yeah why not.   Can I get you another beer, yours is almost empty, etc.  And that's what happened here.  It's the art of service, and good servers pay for themselves.  It's not pushy or overbearing, it's just good service/making sure the customer has everything they need, and a little curry house in the Gtr Manchester hills is nailing that.

A less creamy option was our next choice; a Lamb Balti Jalfrezi which served as a reminder than whilst I love chilli, it has a habit of humiliating me with a sweat covered brow.  Plenty of well-cooked onions delivered a great texture and background savoury/sweetness to the punchy gravy, and the lamb was fall-apart cooked.  Another textbook curry, all things considered. 

Both curries were sat on a candle heater, fully in line with that slightly retro curry house vibe which for me is lacking in so many places these days in favour of a more modern experience, particularly in the city centre where venues do their all to stand out and do something supposedly different.  Sometimes though, you just want something to be what it is without any messing about.  In fact, I want that most of the time and received it from Mala.

No curry would be complete without the carbs, and we decided on a pilau rice and also a garlic naan, to share between us.  You can pick any rice/naan from the menu, but we stuck to the classics and both were more than plentiful. The naan's garlic was perhaps a touch raw for some tastebuds, but there was no mistaking the quality and portion size of the bread, with those blistered pockets delivering that unmistakable tandoor scent.  The ideal way to mop up any gravy that might escape your fork/spoon.

So, don’t be one of those people who sees a place that you've once enjoyed close down after 20+ years of serving the community, only to then virtue signal on socials with comments like 'So gutted, I loved that place!!', etc.  Well when did you last visit since you loved it so much?  7 years prior just like us?  It's easily done sure as life gets in the way sometimes, but we 100% won't wait another 7 years to book in again, especially at these prices and nor should you. 

Looking beyond that 3.5 score, this for me is exactly how a proper small independent Indian restaurant in Britain should be.  Sure, it's not Gymkhana but then it's not trying to be.  So yes, Mala scores 3.5 out of 5, but as per this blurb the service was truly on point, we had plenty of delicious food, and it was exceptional value for money.  For us it's a winning combination and just what consumers want right now.  Could this be North Manchester's best value a la carte curry?  I wouldn’t bet against it.