Historical version 2 of Saffron (view current version)

Kake, 15 Apr 2000

Saffron is a recently-opened Indian-French restaurant in Summertown - no, that doesn't mean fusion cuisine, but two separate menus. The French menu has nothing even potentially vegan apart from ratatouille, but the Indian menu has a separate vegetarian section, most of which is vegan. The poppadoms brought when you sit down are accompanied by some of the tastiest chutneys I've ever had - the tomato-chilli one is absolutely gorgeous.

I started with chickpea puri, small pieces of deep-fried crispy bread filled with a tasty chickpea stew and served with two dips. I could have eaten this twice over, but was glad I hadn't when I saw that the main course was of the same quality! Five of us shared five main dishes and accompanying rice - and this was plenty, even without any side dishes. The pumpkin with spinach was very good, and the vegetable rogan was made with really fresh, ripe, juicy tomatoes. The accompanying lemon rice was zingy and refreshing, and the spinach rice was tasty too. Overall, the menu had an excellent range of choices - I need to go again soon, to try all the rest!

To finish, we had cocktails - mine was the Saffron Spice, which is blue, fruity and delicious. The bill came to £78 for five of us, three drinking alcohol and three not.

This is version 2 (as of 2003-10-26 12:23:05). View current version. List all versions.