Akbars - Review of the restaurant
Akbars, claims to be Indian on the front page, but on further inspection the web site reveals that their specialities, namely Balti's, come from an area called Baltistan in the far north of Pakistan - I'm not sure I believe this, am expected to believe that there is a placed called bucket ville? (Actually there is!) He he, But balti is roughly translated as 'bucket' - more specifically meaning that everything is cooked in one pot that you eat out of - regardless, I was often in Birmingham in the late eighties early nineties when Balti's first made their appearance there and quite frankly I think things have gone down hill - the idea was that it was *cheap* - like £1.50 for a meal,we used to go and perch our bums on the crappy plastic seats, take our own beer in and enjoy some of the best (read HOT and SPICY) food I've ever had,,, well, I'm not going to make a fuss... It's probably a bit of everything!
History lesson over and on to Akbars itself, WOW what a buzz - if there is one thing that can be said about this place is that it *does* have atmosphere - the waiters and chefs (yes they bring the food they cook to you directly) rushing around and the hubub of chatter from the clientèle (many of whom were of Asian origin I noticed - usually a good sign) made for more of a Saturday night feel than a boring Tuesday - incredible! Absolutely no complaints here! The decor/presentation didn't make that much of an impression, it is pleasant enough, but nothing spectacular. Raj our waiter introduced himself and did well keeping up with our orders for extra drinks and dealing with what turned out to be quite a large order - there were 9 of us in the end I think!
OK, so the food, well, I have to say that while there was nothing bad, it wasn't that amazing either, the Anglicization of cuisine I have talked about before seems to have gone rather too far here, there is certainly nothing in the style of cooking, that balti word again, that would suggest that these dishes have anything in common with their Birmingham/North Pakistan origins - the Roshan Lal - described as a spicy lamb dish was most definitely not spicy! (I must stress that it wasn't bad - I licked my plate clean - it just failed to meet expectations - oh those dangerous things!) The Chicken Tikka bordered on sickly and was left unfinished! The starters seemed better - lots of smiles and clean plates all around and the naan breads were huge - hanging on their own little naan trees!! Overall - I think a 5/10 - sorry Akbar, this didn't hit my buttons at all! Not bad, not expensive (£148 for 9 of us including drinks and we all had starters and mains) just not particularly exciting or to my taste - there are far, far better Indian restaurants in Manchester!
