Dean and I LOVE a good Indian curry and we are now very partial to making them. Having been to Lasan twice before and both times having an excellent meal we wanted to return this time to do a review for the blog.
We decided to make a weekend of it and stayed in a nearby hotel so we could also experience some of their wine. I am on Lasan’s mailing list and they are great at keeping you up to date with what’s going on in the restaurant. As it was my birthday they sent me a voucher for £20 off the bill, which I thought was a really nice gesture!
I came across Lasan when looking for an Indian restaurant for Dean’s birthday one year. I found out it had been recommended by Gordon Ramsay and was featured on his programme the ‘F Word’, winning an award for best local restaurant. Chef Aktar Islam has also gained local celebrity status after appearing on the BBC’s Great British Menu.
Going on our previous experiences we were very much looking forward to our meal.
After studying the menu for quite a while we were still unsure what to choose, so we spoke to the waiter who was very helpful and we came to the decision to go for a tasting menu. We were both excited as we knew we were going to get to try a few different dishes. The first four dishes were appetisers including a lentil soup, duck samosa, soft shell crab and a tandoori prawn.
All these were very tasty, Dean’s favourite was the prawn he thought it had a great, smoky tandoori flavour and really enjoyed the texture. Myself, I thought the samosa was very flavoursome, containing smoked duck. It worked really well with the cucumber. Our only small criticism was that it could have had a bit more filling in there, but overall it was excellent.
The remaining four dishes were slightly larger in proportions.
Jhol
I was really looking forward to the fish dish as it was turbot, one of my favourites. Being quite a meaty fish I knew it would hold together well in the sauce. The broth was really good having so much flavour, with the coriander really coming through. This dish was very delicate and light, we both really enjoyed it.
Murgh Malai
Each course seemed like it was getting better and better, and we were very pleased we took the waiter’s advice on having the tasting menu. This was the chicken dish and I couldn’t wait to try it when it came. We are very much in to our lentils at the moment and the chicken worked really well with them. For a small drumstick it was very succulent and tasted so good. The vibrant green sauce, which the waiter spooned on, worked very well and Dean finished the rest off in the side dish, we couldn’t waste any!
Laal Mass
This dish was the star of the show, so much so that Dean even got a bit emotional! We both love lamb in curries and were expecting great things of this combination of coriander crusted rack and slow cooked, meltingly tender rillette shoulder.
The dish was served with spiced aubergine (a vegetable we love at the moment), wilted choi sum and possibly the greatest curry sauce we’ve ever had – smoked Rajistani lamb sauce. We both thought the choi sum, a vegetable mainly used in oriental cooking, was a great addition.
The coriander crusted rack, served slightly pink was incredibly juicy and flavoursome. The slow cooked shoulder was superb and the whole lot combined with the smoky sauce was truly amazing.
Also accompanying this dish was some rice and garlic naan. They went very well and the naan was ideal for soaking up every last drop of that knockout sauce.
If you go to Lasan I urge you to try this dish – you won’t be disappointed!
Bombay Mess
When the waiter bought our dessert to the table I straight away thought WOW – it looked stunning. It was definitely a “me” dessert. After such an excellent meal this was a great way to end – it was light, fresh and a real palette cleanser. It had quite a few elements to the dish, such as meringue which gave it he crunch, a mango mousse which was really creamy and smooth and a raspberry sorbet which gave it freshness. Along with the berries, fruit and Thai basil the dessert had a really exotic taste.
In conclusion
We had a truly wonderful evening at Lasan and I would highly recommend coming here, if you’re not from Birmingham then it’s a great city and you can definitely make a weekend of it. You know you’re in a good restaurant when it takes you half an hour to decide what to have. The menu was full of so many great sounding dishes that we will be retuning soon to Lasan to try more!
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