As far as I could see, Harrogate has seven Indian restaurants in the town centre area, and conveniently all but one are within spitting distance of each other (and the other not far away). There is another a little on the edge of town to the north in Devonshire Place.

The one in town slightly away from the cluster of others is the Shahnaz in Station Parade. It is an upstairs restaurant and the narrow entrance a street level does not entice one to venture further, but from the menu displayed outside it appears a standard high street example.

The others are situated in or around Cheltenham Crescent/Parade at the lower end of town. As you go down the hill the first is the Rajput, a reasonable looking restaurant with dark wooden tables situated just a few steps below street level. It opened in 1992 and advertises itself as the longest family run Indian restaurant in Harrogate. It's certainly not the longest established, but perhaps the others haven’t been family run or under the same ownership.

Going down the hill we come to Ali Raj, which is on the corner of Cheltenham Crescent and Cheltenham Parade. Another upstairs restaurant which, the manager told me, has been there for ‘about 20 years’. It had a cosy, well used appearance and again a fairly standard high street curry house menu.

A few doors down is Kinara in a converted house, while next door is the Bengal Spice which, the owner told me, has been there ‘a long time’. Again, both looked nice, cosy, standard high street curry houses with menus to match.

Opposite is probably the newest and most unusual restaurant, Jinnah, which is situated in an old stone-built chapel which was part of a Wesleyan school. It certainly looks different, both inside and out, and we chose this one for our evening meal. A separate report gives more details. The one in Devonshire Place on the edge of town is also one of the more up-market Jinnah chain.

The last on is just a stones throw from Cheltenham Parade in Oxford Street and is called the Cinnamon Room. Again relatively new, opening in early 2003, it is a first floor restaurant with modern light wood flooring, chrome fittings, small bar at one end and a contemporary air about it. It is advertised as being ‘low fat cooking with no artificial colouring’ and certainly looked in the modern style. A little smaller than I expected for the type of restaurant (it only appeared to have about fifteen tables) and understandably packed on a Saturday night. Of all the restaurants, it was the one which I could smell from the outside, and the smells were extremely enticing!

What with this variety of Indian restaurants it was a hard choice as to which one to visit. I am quite sure that the standard looking restaurants around Cheltenham Crescent all produce a good  high street formula curry - all seemed well patronised - and the two more modern restaurants added an extra dimension. Although a difficult choice, I would have been happy to eat in any of them. And I am sure would have had a good meal in any of them.

Malcolm Wilkins - January 2004