Our view on Darlington's newest Indian restaurant

The rain ran down the windows of the curryhouse while the condensation rolled down the insides. Not that I minded – I’d scored at least three (old footballers are a billion times worse than anglers when it comes to exaggeration) – and the most fabulous curry was in a giant pot.

The staff had slow cooked it overnight from bits of meat and pieces of bone they had to hand, and about 30 of us – the two teams and all of the large crowd we had drawn – dived in.

So when I spotted “staff meat curry” on the menu of Darlington’s newest curryhouse, Arvelli in Northgate, I knew what I had to try.

Arvelli opened in late November into a crowded market place in an old Indian restaurant next to the crowd-pleasing Eastern Bamboo. It can seat 80, but it has been done up diner-style with its large interior broken comfortably into intimate bays.

Arvelli – which apparently means “your destiny” – has some nice touches which make it stand out from the town’s other Indians. The first that really struck me was the menu was not on a scratty piece of paper but came in the form of a 12-page clothbound book.

The book contains all of the time honoured curries – bhuna, tikka, dansak, masala – which are made from vegan bases, plus many that were new to me: satkora, for instance, being a medium curry cooked in a Bangladeshi citrus fruit. Starters are typically about £5.50 while most main courses are a few pennies short of a tenner. Takeaway mains are a pound cheaper.

The pickles tray at Arvelli to go with the fresh, crisp poppadums

Petra, my wife, and I began with a fresh, crisp poppadum each, which came with a good pickle tray and a very nice tomato and onion sprinkling salad.

For starters, Petra had the Sabji Pakora (£3.95) (above), which was deep fried, bite-sized pieces of cauliflower, aubergine and potatoes in batter. They were light, crispy and tasty.

I opted for the Mach Tandoori (£5.50) (above), which was a small white fish – a tilapia – coated in the orangey tandoori marinade. It must be the Indian equivalent of whitebait: fishy enough without being too fishy and here it was given a little tandoori taste. I really liked it.

Both starters were served with artful salads with spirals of beetroot and twists of orange among the lettuce.

For her main course, Petra had the Karai Salmon (£9.95) (above), which was a fillet cooked in a wok with a tomatoey sauce made up of garlic, chillies and onions. She thought it very good. It was a little hotter than she had expected but still the salmon shone through.

I, of course, had the “staff meat curry” (£13.95) (above, with a spinach bhaji side dish) which was lamb on a variety of bones – a traditional Bangladeshi dish. The lamb had been slow cooked for hours so it just fell from the bones. The dish was quite hot – like a jalfrezi, which gives me pleasant beads of perspiration around the head – and the sauce was golden and gentle so it didn’t overshadow the lamb. After all these years, I have no idea how it compared to the Bradford staff meat curry, but this was a clever combination, skilfully handled.

We accompanied our main courses with a bowl of mushroom rice (£3.75), a garlic nan (£3.25) and a saag bhaji (£4.25) – a spinach side dish. The meatiness of my meat curry really benefitted from the hint of greenery of the spinach, and somehow I finished the lot, wiping the beads off my head with a welcome hot towel.

Petra couldn’t manage all of her salmon and while we were admiring another table’s spectacular thali – a compartmentalised circular dish of five different curries – she spotted the staff happily packaging up their leftovers. Consequently, the salmon came home with us in a doggy bag.

The bill for two, with drinks, came to £63.15. Service was friendly and chatty, with care given to explaining some of the strange sounding dishes on the menu. Arvelli can stand out in Darlington’s crowded curry market because this was a meal that was memorable on its own terms.

Arvelli,
192, Northgate,
Darlington DL1 1QU

Tel: 01325-480252

Web: arvelli.co.uk

Ambience 7; Food quality 8; Service 8; Value for money 8