Eastzeast - Riverside, Manchester

After a great night at Manchester MEN watching Peter Kay, four of us left the venue feeling a little hungry. The waves of people took us along Corporation Street. Once we were able to get to a quiet point we stopped to consult Google places. Within minutes of searching Indian Restaurants we were on our way to "eastzeast Riverside" following the directions on the phone. After 5 mins of walking we had found it, from first impressions it looked like a bar on a busy Friday night.

After going inside we enquired about a table for four to which we were told it could be up to a 20min wait. Whilst waiting we took a seat at the bar for a drink. The bar area was nice and airy with an intriguing frosted glass area, which was for private dining.

We were called as our table was ready and shown down stairs. The seating area was deceptively large and busy for the time of night, the decor was nice and even had big palm trees dotted around, which we couldn't work out if were real or not.

Although we had said no to poppadoms they were bought to the table on the house with an impressive pickle tray containing the usual lime pickle, raita, mango chutney but also some not so usual ones like a very testy garlic chutney and a tomato chutney, all labelled on the bottom of the tray.

The starters where brought out very fast, 3 Onion Bhajis (£2.95) and 1 Lamb Chops (£5.95). The lamb chops had plenty of meat on them, they were nice and tender if a little too charred in places from the tandoori oven. The Onion Bhajis were fresh and light but had a very fiery chilli kick to them.

The mains soon followed, I had a Tiger King Prawns Biryani (£13.95) served with a punjabi raita and a hot curry sauce. I could taste the subtle spices in the rice and the sauce complimented it well, another plus to the dish was they weren't shy with the Tiger prawns. My dining guests had  Karahi Gosht Dopiaza (£10.95), Karahi Murgh Tikka Masala (£9.95) which wasn't the normal dayglow orange colour and a Prawn Rogan Josh (£8.95) to which we were asked if we would like tiger prawns or small prawns with the Rogan Josh. As the comment from across the table was "Mmm this is by far the best Rogan Josh Ive had in a while." I just had to have a try. The rich sauce with tomatoes was nice and thick and almost creamy. It was a very good Rogan Josh indeed!

The bill for the four of us came to just under £80. Very reasonable for the quality of the food being served. On our way out we noticed an ice cream and coffee counter so we couldn't resist in having one for the road. The quality and service of the whole place was great from walking into the bar to chilling in the ice cream and coffee lounge at the end. Definitely a great find from Google and certainly worth a visit if your over the Pennines and fancy a good curry.

Eastzeast Manchester Riverside
Blackfriars Street
Deansgate
Manchester
M3 5BQ

Website


Tel:0161 834 3500

Opening Times
Monday to Thursday: 5.00pm - 11.30pm
Friday & Saturday: 5.00pm - 12.00 Midnight
Sunday: 5.00pm - 11.00pm



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Lily Kwok's Chinese Chicken Curry

I really enjoy a good curry whether its Indian or Chinese but trying to replicate them at home is fairly hard. I stumbbled across this recipe for Lily Kwok's chicken curry a few years ago.

Lily Kwok opened Lung Fung, on Taylor Street Manchester, one of the first Chinese restaurants in the country, in 1959. Her distinctively creamy Lily Kwok curry became famous. Lily’s daughter Mabel continued in the family business and in 2004 her three granddaughters, became the third generation of women restaurateurs, opening the Sweet Mandarin restaurant in Manchester, where they still serve Lily Kwok’s Chicken Curry.

This is a fairly spicy curry as my sister will tell you (sorry sis), so adjust the amount of chilli's according to taste.

INGREDIENTS
For the sauce
6 tbsp vegetable oil
3 onions, finely chopped
4 cm piece ginger, peeled and thinly sliced
4 cloves garlic, sliced
4 mild fleshy red chillies, seeds removed and chopped
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tbsp chilli powder
2 1/2 tsp curry powder
125 ml water
2 1/2 tsp plain flour
2 1/2 tsp self-raising flour
400 - 500 ml chicken or vegetable stock

For the chicken
3-4 tbsp cornflour
2 chicken breasts
2 tbsp oil
1/2 onion, thinly sliced
2 tbsp fresh peas


METHOD
1) For the sauce: Heat the oil in a heavy-based pan or wok over a high heat. Add the onion and stir-fry for 3 minutes, or until starting to soften but not brown. Add the ginger, garlic and chillies and continue stir-frying for 30 seconds, then reduced the heat to very low and leave to cook, stirring occasionally, until the onion is softened but nothing browns.

2) Stir in the turmeric, cumin, coriander, chilli powder and curry powder and continue cooking very gently for a further 5 minutes. Don’t burn the spices or the sauce will taste bitter. Sprinkle on a few drops of water if you’re worried. Remove the pan from the heat and allow the mixture to cool a little.

3) Put the water in a food processor or blender and add the contents of the pan. Blend until everything is very smooth, then add both the flours and blend again. Put the puréed mixture back into the pan and simmer for 20–30 minutes (the longer the better) over a very low heat, stirring occasionally. Add a little hot water if it starts to catch, but the idea is to gently ‘fry’ the sauce so that it darkens in colour to an orangey brown. Once you have a thick paste, gradually stir in the stock and simmer until the curry sauce has reduced.

4) For the chicken: season the cornflour with salt and pepper to taste, and toss the chicken strips in this to coat them. Heat the oil in a large frying pan over a high heat. Add the chicken pieces and stir-fry for a couple of minutes until they turn white. Add the onion and peas and stir-fry for a further few minutes, then stir in the curry sauce and heat until everything is piping hot. Serve immediately with boiled rice.