The Masalla Merchant

Visited the Masalla Merchant for the first time in a while last night, and had a really nice meal. I 'd say this place is probably the best of the numerous Indian restaurants in the area the buckle in the Stirchley curry belt. I arrived a little earlier than my fellow diners and sat on a comfy sofa by the entrance, clutching my bottles of beer. This is a bring your own booze restaurant (which really keeps the bill down). I recommend getting drinks from the excellent Stirchley Wines, which is just a short trot up the Pershore Road, and is full of excellent and unusual beers, wines and spirits. However, if you 're feeling lazy there is a standard off license virtually next to the restaurant. Once my fellow guests arrived we were seated at a large table in one corner of the restaurant and served the traditional poppadoms and dips. The menus are crammed with loads of traditional dishes, plus a 'contemporary ' section. If anything the menu is too big, and we all took a while to navigate it. After ordering, the food did take quite a while to arrive, perhaps because the restaurant had become much more busy. Our food all arrived at once, in a flurry of naan and sizzling hot dishes. I ordered a hot lamb dish (something, something Naga) from the contemporary dishes section, with a peshwari naan and fried rice. The curry was delicious, with chunks of really tender lamb in a hot but really flavourful sauce. The naan was light and sweet, filled with almond and drizzled in honey. Perfect combo. Two of our group went for vegetarian dishes, including the paneer cheese parcels, which looked great and, I 'm told, were really tasty. Overall, I rate this place. Service can be a little slow but the food is really tasty and the prices are reasonable. Our bill was accompanied by white chocolate mice and gummy bears to sweeten the deal (although at £77 for 6 of us it was already pretty palatable). Retro sweet win.

Brilliant staff who were welcoming and friendly, and absolutely gorgeous food at good prices. You couldn't want or need more.

I really love this place. The food is fantastic and its a resturant rather than a curry house. The menu is great and staff are helpful. It can get very busy though. I often go early or during the week. Its a place you can either get really dressed up for or be casual. You need to book. Deserts are nice and the fab thing is at the end you get loads of free oranges, kids sweets and baileys/brandy yum. You can take your own drinks and there is a off licence next door. They dont have a high chair but are good with kids. Oh, and the ladies get a rose when you leave. Its really the extras that do it. I got a christmas present when I went one year! Parking at the back, but also road and other car park space around.

Masalla Merchant is a place where we tend to go on work meals. I have been here couple of time and although it's not mind blowing, they do a decent curry with a massive choice on their menu. It is more a Bengali restaurant so you will find dishes you may not be familiar with, but menu consists of many dishes from the whole Indian subcontinent. It's a bring your own restaurant which has certainly brought down the price per person when I have been in large group and split the bill. For my starter, I had the fried Fish which was soggy with oil, which I didn't enjoy so much. My main dish was a tamarind prawn dish which was very rich in sauce and taste, There is a vast section on the menu which has the curry houses speciality dishes, which come with pilau rice which made it very good value. Masalla Merchant is a nice restaurant in Stirchley which is very popular with the locals, and has been busy on both of my visits and worth a visit for sure.

We had a fairly good meal in here recently. The food was fresh and tasty and fairly reasonable. It was a busy evening, and the restaurant was fairly cramped, but we didn't have to wait too long for our food, and the staff were friendly and had a good chat with us. I like my curry hot, my wife likes hers mild and they catered for both of us. In fairness, we are spoilt here in Birmingham with a choice of literally hundreds of places to get a curry. As such, a restaurant really has to pull out all the stops to get a fantastic review, and we all have our personal favourites. In another city this would be one of the best curry houses around. In Brum it's just another curry house.