LEICESTER and CURRY are popular words at the moment as this week the finalists of the Leicester Curry Awards 2019 have just been announced.

Now in its third year, the Leicester Curry Awards recognises both the City’s and County’s vibrant Asian culture and the culinary craftsmanship that goes into making Leicester one of the UK’s most prized curry destinations.

In contrast, Leicester Curry Club is now in its 9^th year and having just visited our 99^th different establishment within Leicestershire, we definitely think we know what we are talking about when it comes to Curry… why not take time to search and read our previous Reviews/Scores on our website.

Our March visit (no. 99) was to a newly opened restaurant in Aylestone which is a suburb of Leicester, southwest of the city centre and not far from where Leicester City legend Gary Lineker’s life began in the game at Aylestone Park Football Club.

Aylestone Spice is a small cosy restaurant on the main Aylestone Road that serves both Indian and Bangladeshi traditional home cooked food. It seats around 24 diners and although not licensed welcomes you to take your own alcohol (BYOB)… there is a small supermarket next door should you forget.

There is restricted parking on the main road outside and also on the surrounding streets should you be lucky enough to find a space. As the designated driver I again dropped my fellow members off outside and joined them a few minutes later (which always goes down well and of course saves the moans and groans of a walk in the rain and the chance of the scores being affected).

Although a Tuesday night there were a total of 13 diners and a regular sighting of the ‘takeaway delivery driver’ is always a good impression as it is not unusual for us to be eating alone sometimes during our midweek visits.

We ordered the statutory poppadoms and pickle trays which were on the table within a few minutes… again there were only 3 varieties of pickles (mango chutney, chopped onion and a mint yogurt) although they did bring out an additional lime pickle dish.

Five different mains were ordered, those being Zeera Chicken, Amritsari Madras, Chicken Tawa, Honey Chilli Chicken and an off the menu Chicken Chana Saag. All dishes were well presented, fresh and extremely flavoursome.

The accompaniments we chose were dishes that we hadn’t seen before, Lime & Cashew Nut Rice and Keema & Peas Rice which were both very nice indeed and as well as the usual Tandoori Roti, Plain Naan, Cheese Naan and Garlic/Cheese Naan, the extra Coriander that we often request at time of order, actually arrived without a prompt. A complimentary vegetable side dish was also brought out with the mains which is obviously a well received gesture.

The staff were polite and friendly and the service was good… as it is only a small restaurant, if you did need anything, you only had to look over to the bar area and one of the waiters would catch your eye.

As you will know by now we do not partake in Desserts so requested the bill which was presented with the standard ‘After Dinner Mints’. The total cost was around £70 for the five of us which was exceptional value for the quality of the food and we would have no hesitation in recommending this new restaurant should you be in the area and wanting a very good curry… all major credit and debit cards accepted.

A couple of comments that we would like to make that although didn’t affect our enjoyment, we would prefer if pint glasses were available (as the present ones do not take a full can of beer so having 5 cans on the table as well as the glasses is not ideal when the food arrives) and also that the staff would ensure that the song loop is changed regularly (as we listened to My Heart Will Go On by Celine Dion for 1.5 hours).

Unfortunately Aylestone Spice missed out on becoming a finalist in The 2019 Leicester Curry Awards ‘Best New Restaurant’ category which in our opinion was a shame as the food here is most enjoyable… what we don’t understand is how last year’s ‘Best New Restaurant’ winner (2018) is again a finalist in the same category this year? Not sure how you can be classed as ‘Best New Restaurant’ 2 years running?

Anyway a very enjoyable evening and hope that this restaurant continues to please its diners and gains the reputation in the area that they deserve.

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