Mel literally ate all she could.......

Like any normal review, Mel tends to try a selection of dishes from a restaurant’s menu and then waffle on about it, however on this occasion, we need to be exact. Largely because Mel managed to try 30 dishes; yes.....THIRTY!

Before you get over excited (and worried about Mel’s health), this review was conducted at the Indian banqueting restaurant; Manzil which is an ‘all you can eat’ style banqueting hall located two minutes from the Manchester Evening News Arena.

Always busy when she has driven past, it was time to pull into the large car park and give it a whirl. Luckily for Mel, she had booked a table because this particular Friday evening was absolutely chock-a-block with families, young groups of friends and people celebrating birthdays.

Customary poppadums were presented along with a large jug of Pepsi as no alcohol is served here, not that it put off the 70+ diners in the restaurant who were more interested in the food than beer.

Although the poppadums with dips (lime pickle, onions in tomato sauce, mango chutney and a raita) were good, the aromas coming from the vast amount of food stations was overwhelming and Mel was keen to get cracking on the real reason she was here.

With any ‘all you can eat’, there is a strategy in place; you want to eat as much variation as possible to get a real experience, and as you can see below – Mel succeeded.

Starters included; chicken tikka, lamb seek kebab, garlic chicken tikka, lamb chapli kebab, Dhaka niblets, chicken pakora, chicken wings, peri peri chicken, and masala fish. Lots of protein here, so a good stocked salad bar was necessary – luckily, this too was first class and offered a break between meat bites. If you like your Asian starters, you’d be here all night – they were seriously good.

The mains were also very very good and many of the dishes came with the meat on the bone; tender, flavoursome and authentic in taste (apne style), they seemed to be dishes which would get better as they sat in the vats, not dry out – great method and it worked. The mains Mel tried included; chicken tikka masala, chicken karahi, spicy chilli chicken, lamb karai, lamb jalfrezi, lamb karela, lamb pilau, chicken biryani, nehari, paya, and chicken keema mattar.

There were another dozen vegetarian dishes available including bhajis, tarka dall and sag aloo. Coupled with the various pilau rice (peas pilau being her favourite) and a fresh naan bread and this was quickly turning into the best Indian meal she had ever had.

One thing Mel doesn’t generally like is Indian dessert. Normally too sweet and heavily enriched with marzipan; the ones here were soothing to the rich mains and excelled with variety. Particularly good desserts included the kheer (rice pudding with Vermicelli noodles), bubblegum ice-cream and individual homemade sweets.

All in all, an exceptional meal with first class service from the staff who explained several of the dishes (including how they are made) – Mel is already trying to replicate the tarka dall. And at £11.99 each, you’ll be hard pushed to find anywhere who will offer you so much variety and enjoyment for that in the city.

Give it a try and just tell them you saw this on Onionring!

---

Posted: Saturday 14th May 2016
ID: 10349 - 917