Menu - Sai

Just had my 50th Celebration at Sai with all my family and friends, everyone had a fantastic time... the food was beyond amazing, Vin helped with the design of... read more Just had my 50th Celebration at Sai with all my family and friends, everyone had a fantastic time... the food was beyond amazing, Vin helped with the design of the menu and the service was excellent too, can't fault it. highly recommend.

SeriousIy really raised hopes to see a Punjabi restaurant within a 5 mile drive from my home. There was I thinking “no more epic journeys to Southall”….. some o... read more SeriousIy really raised hopes to see a Punjabi restaurant within a 5 mile drive from my home. There was I thinking “no more epic journeys to Southall”….. some of our local Bangladeshi restaurants make a pretty decent effort to produce north Indian type dishes, but you can’t beat the real thing. A true Punjabi restaurant as you might find in a city like Chandigarh would give meat eaters and vegetarians equal preference – not just in choice, but also quality. The menu looked just about right when I saw it online – so, off to Raynes park we went. The gold standard for Punjabi vegetarian dishes would include Paneer Tikka/Shashlik and Dal Makhani, so I ordered both. The Dal was just odd…none of the tang, sweetness and colour of tomato, none of the zing of ginger and watery texture with little of the required buttery luxury that should come from the all night cooking…dare I say that I’ve tasted better Dal Makhani that’s come from a tin? The Paneer Tikka on the other hand was a total disgrace. A few thin slices of what looked like shop-bought paneer dyed a pinky/purple colour there was none of the beautiful texture of the bricks of homemade paneer that you’ll get in a good Southall restaurant (let alone the Punjab itself) none of the exhilarating aroma of the yoghurt based and spiced marinade. This was a dismal excuse for a Paneer Tikka…any self-respecting Punjabi would have sent it back! As we left, scratching our heads, I wondered if the chefs in Sai were actually Punjabis – the all important vegetarian fare was not good enough. Some Bengali places do it better.