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We had a very good night here. I would describe Hotstuff as one of the cheapest destination restaurants in town. When you've been you will want to go back - a shame for me, because it's quite a treck to get to from my place. It's just down the road from where they filmed 'My Beautiful Launderette' and Will Self is supposed to be a regular, though he wasn't there when we went. It is very small. Indeed. So I think it is wise to book. You can sit outside and it was hot when we went, so we did. You bring your own wine and if you forget there is an off-licence next door, as there so often is on these occasions. Strange, that.
It's quite brash and in-yer-face inside, the kitchen is highly visible and one entire wall is covered in accolades and citations. The second chief attraction is Raj, the owner, who is very personable and and entertaining. He is also genuinely passionate about the food. The cuisine, which is the first chief attraction, is mostly Pakistani, he told us. The gist of what he said was that this was real Indian - well, subcontinental - cuisine and that there were no plastic Chicken Tikka Massalas and other bastardisations and inauthentic hybrids to be had here. It was all proper, handed down from your mum, stuff. Also, those with challenged midriffs note, nothing was cooked in ghee. I had a sort of chicken tikka to start and then a lamb curry. They were both excellent with a tang of authenticity to them which you do not often find. Someone had dahl soup which was amazing and freshly prepared but did take a little while to arrive. We also had lashings of popadoms and naan. In fact we had what looked to be a lot of things, I had a bit of all of them and they were all great. The bill, when it came, was so low I thought there had been a mistake. This is not the place for a romantic tryst but if you want a great night out, or to sample proper Indian food, or both, for very little money indeed, it's hard to better.
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