It’s been a while since I either a) wrote anything about Notting Hill other than as it pertains to the Rotten Hill Gang or b) reviewed a restaurant. I’m about to redress one of those at least.
OK so Harlesden High Street isn’t exactly in Notting Hill, but then this part of it isn’t exactly in what you’d think of as Harlseden. It’s really a bit of Harrow Road and only 5 minutes away from, say, Ladbroke Grove by car, so it’s definitely within striking distance and, as I can confirm, easy enough to reach twice in an evening to fetch your takeaway. More of that in a minute.
Whether it’s that there genuinely have been more restaurants opening up to serve Persian food in the last two years or that we’ve just become more aware of them, we’ve found ourselves craving them in the way that previously I’d crave Indian, or Wifey would crave sushi. While I can’t claim to know a Persian menu well enough to order blind in the way that any self respecting British person can order from most Indian restaurants without seeing the menu, I’ve developed a liking for certain dishes. That said, as a vegetarian most Persian restaurants usually struggle to offer more than one main course so I don’t find choosing that hard.
However we’ve never thought that we’d found a favourite Persian restaurant, until, that is, tonight. On a whim (the actual whim was for a pub dinner, but it’s amazing how hunger can blur the decision making process) we decided to order from Salaam, a fairly new place that had somehow been “speaking to us” for months. Our experience of places that “speak to us” have led to some disastrous consequences which is probably why we delayed going there.
We ordered starters of panir-o-sabzi (fresh mint and tarragon with spring onions, radish, feta cheese and walnuts) and kashk-o-bademjan, (fried aubergines with fried onions, walnuts, garlic spices and herbs) and way too much of their delicious naan bread. The sabzi I always order and the aubergine, with its barbecued overtones takes my current prize for the tastiest substance known to mankind.
For our mains I ordered Pollow Khoresh Bamiyeh, a stew of okra, green peppers and onions cooked in a tomato and tamarind sauce, while Wifey had … well I’m not quite sure what Wifey had actually. I’m just no good with these meat based dishes after 23 years of veggie-goodness and she’s asleep right now. Something with lamb in it at any rate and she was raving about it. Both came with rice. Suffice to say that despite the HUGE portions, we wolfed our food down with embarrassing ease.
Oh - and how did I find out that it’s close enough to get to twice? Well because the first time they managed to miss out my main course, they got Wifey’s main slightly wrong and they gave us plain rice instead of the dill rice we asked for, but despite that we will still most definitely go back! The food there is simply fantastic, the bill was only £21, the service super friendly and Salaam is now our favourite Persian restaurant in town.
Do yerselves a favour and hotfoot it down there.
Salaam Restaurant
203 High Street
Harlesden
London NW10 4TE
020 8838 0007


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