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LONDON | Hankies Marble Arch is an Indian restaurant that aims to present an ‘upscale’ take on traditional Delhi street food. We were recently invited to check it out and were interested to see what this simple and intriguing concept was all about. Located inside the luxury Montcalm hotel, the restaurant gives an immediate classy feel, with beautiful warm lighting and art deco meets India style decorations.
There is a wide variety of choices on the menu for every taste: venison, lamb, fish, shellfish, vegetables, chicken, and even duck. While Delhi acts as the inspiration for the food, Hankies makes the most of seasonal British ingredients. Roomali roti aka Hankies, the restaurant’s namesake, is a must. The roti is skilfully cooked on a heated dome, which produces thin, fluffy handkerchief-like roti. If you want something more with a deeper flavour punch, try the spinach roomali, served with achars/chutney.
For small bites, we had bhindi bhel (crispy okra, rice puff in sweet chutney), sweet potato bomb, and bhatak ki khurchan, which is crispy duck with masala cashew nuts. These are great fun to look at and to eat – the sweet potato bomb looks like a scoop of ice-cream, the crispy okra is served as a tower topped with a rice puff, and the crispy duck is mixed in with an assortment of ingredients. The presentation is a more than a cut above your usual London Indian restaurant but it’s never at the expense of flavour.
When it comes to mains, the dishes are more familiar Indian classics. We went for butter chicken, and Kankda (stirred fried masala crab meat and potatoes), accompanied by small grills of lamb chops and garlic prawn skewers. While the Kankda was slightly on the salty side, the butter chicken was indulgently creamy, and the tender charred lamb chop was something we could have had more and more of.
We ended our night with a tasty cocktail, the ‘Ginger Ananas’ with pineapple juice, Jamaican rum, ginger honey, and cinnamon, as well as a simple, well blended masala chai.
Overall we were happy with our meal at Hankies – the menu features an assortment of dishes to suit most tastes and is reasonably priced – an average order of around 6 dishes between two people means you get to try a lot. A great place to share food and drinks with friends, in a calm and sophisticated setting.
Hankies (Marble Arch)
61 Upper Berkeley Street
London W1H 7PP
United Kingdom
Telephone: 020 7958 3222
Email: [email protected]
Website: Website
Open
Mon – Sat: 12:00pm to 3:00pm; 5:45pm to 11:00pm