The venue for our first visit of 2024 took us to Little India, which is situated on the main road in the small market town of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, approximately 20 miles North-West of Leicester.

The restaurant has been in the town for around 7 years and offers Indian and Bangladeshi cuisine. It is unlicensed, so you are welcome to take your own alcoholic drinks, but should you forget, there is an excellent off-licence a couple of doors down if required.

If you’re lucky, there may be parking available on the road outside, but if not, there is a public car park approximately 150 metres away.

On arrival we were welcomed by their friendly staff and shown to our table. There were quite a few diners already seated which is great to see on a cold Wednesday evening in January.

We were given two different menus, as alongside their A la Carte Menu, they also offer a special ‘Curry Club’ menu (Sunday to Wednesday only), which is good value at £14.95 – this includes a poppadom, a combination starter, a main with either a rice or naan.

As usual, the four of us (we were one down due to illness) decided to opt for the A La Carte menu, which has a number of Exclusive dishes, House specialities, as well as the usual Traditional dishes.

We ordered the statutory two poppadom’s each, along with a relish tray, which consisted of mint sauce, onion salad, and a Little India special sauce.

We then ordered our Mains, these being a Jhall Chicken Tikka Biryani (marinated chicken tikka pieces cooked in the tandoori oven, with chopped green chillies, a Naga sauce, and basmati rice – very hot), a North Indian Chilli Lamb (cooked with fresh garlic and sliced green chilli, with a secret Naga paste to give a slightly hot and spicy flavour), a Chicken Tawa (madras hot – served on a traditional hot pan), and a Chhana Murgi (stripped tandoori chicken cooked with mince meat in a thick bhuna sauce, with sweet chilli sauce, then layered with melted cheese on top).

The accompaniments we chose were a Special Pilau Rice (cooked with a scrambled egg, peas, and a hint of spice), and a Vegetable Pilau Rice, along with a Peshwari Naan, and a Mushroom Naan… the extra Coriander that one member always requests also arrived without a prompt.

We all enjoyed our meal, and all dishes were well presented, fresh and flavoursome, and they were all served at the required strength.

The messages that I received the following morning from our members were;

‘The biryani was generally nice, not at all greasy, but too much fancy salad for me.’
‘I enjoyed the food, the place, the price, and the service.’
‘It was decent, I couldn’t fault it, but would describe it as average.’
‘Nice place with friendly staff, and great value, the Chhana Murgi was very tasty, but probably a little too much oil in the dish.’

Some mixed comments and feedback, but overall, a very enjoyable evening and if ever any of our readers are in North-West Leicestershire, Little India would be a great place to try.

We paid the bill (£71.15), which was always going to be great value when there are no drinks included, and left for the 40-minute journey home.

This was our 141st different venue that we have visited since 2011, and again proves how popular and diverse Leicestershire is for a great Curry. May we offer Imran, Anis, Jay, and their staff our best wishes for the future and hope that this restaurant keeps up the good work and is around for many years to come.

The score out of 40 based on the venue/surroundings/food/service/cost was 31.5.

Please note as always, our reviews are personally subjective and isn’t necessarily what others may think or experience when they visit.