Octobers visit was to the University town of Loughborough and to a Nepalese & Indian restaurant, Himalayan Inn, close to All Saints Church. The restaurant was selected due to its excellent reviews on Trip Advisor, and I found the online ‘Reserve Table’ easy to use and was confirmed the following day via both an email and a very polite text from the manager Kumar.

The restaurant was formerly known as ‘Taste of India’ and the present owners have only been here for around a year. They have another restaurant by the same name in Nottinghamshire which, over the past few years, has built up an extremely good reputation so hopefully this one will follow suit.

There is restricted parking on the street (if you’re lucky enough to find a space) otherwise the nearest car park is approximately ½ mile a way which is not ideal. As the designated driver I dropped my fellow members off outside and I joined them eventually after 20 minutes of trying to find a parking space.

On arrival, we were met by the friendly Kumar and offered a comfy sofa and a pint of their only draft beer ‘Cobra’. One of our members had a bottle of ‘alcohol-free’ Cobra but then had it replaced with a diet coke when he complained that it didn’t taste right… Kumar was apologetic and replaced it no problem.

The restaurant is quite airy with a mixture of seating arrangements, tablecloths and modern LED coloured lights both on the walls and the ceiling. As requested at the time of booking we were shown to our ‘round’ table which was ideal for the 5 of us. Although a Thursday night in a heavily populated student town there were only a handful of people sat eating at 7.30pm.

We ordered the statutory poppadoms and pickle tray which were on the table within minutes. As always the poppadoms were as good as any other but although we were given two pickle trays, there were only 3 varieties (mango chutney, chopped onion and a yogurt) which in our opinion could be improved, especially as this is treated as a starter for many, so a good ‘pickle tray’ can often set the tone for what is in store for the rest of the evening.

Although the menu is varied with a good selection of Nepalese as well as the usual Indian meals, 3 of us chose the Tawa (2 chicken + 1 lamb) and 2 chose the Lashuni Kukhura (chicken) with varying strengths of Jalfrezi, Madras and Vindaloo (or as hot as they could make it!).

The mains were well presented and although in general the sauces were found to be very tasty, the cubes of chicken in the 4 dishes were unfortunately below par… in fact 3 of the members all commented on the way home that they had had trouble chewing some of it and 1 even admitting that they had in fact had to remove it from their mouth and leave it on the side of their plate. The lamb however was found to be tender and seemed to be the better choice on the night.

The rice and naan bread that accompanied the meals were enjoyable, but as with many restaurants we have visited, the extra coriander that we requested at the time of order, again got forgotten and we had to remind the waiter.

We would like to add that although the manager Kumar was polite and friendly, the waiter seemed to be in a hurry and just wanted to put the food on the table as quick as he could and lacked the customer service that is so important if customers are to be retained and recommendations given.

Although the inside of the restaurant is clean and tidy and welcoming with canvas prints on the wall, the rear of the restaurant and the toilets require some work, but hopefully this will come as the restaurant establishes itself a little more.

The cost of the meal was the average £25 per person including tip and unfortunately the low scoring reflected the quality of chicken in 4 of the dishes.

Overall the night was enjoyable as always but the quality of the meat was a little disappointing which we hope was a one-off and the owners can continue their hard work and gain the reputation that their Arnold restaurant already enjoys. As outlined in our September review, we have a discussion in the car on the way home and although sometimes heated, our reviews are personally subjective and aren’t necessarily what others may think or experience when they visit.