Namaasté Kitchen’s Tasting Menu

Amongst my fine dining friends, there is some debate amongst the worth of tasting menus. Some of them think that tasting menus are the perfect way to sample the food of a restaurant, to dip in and get a wide spread of dishes. Others throw their hands up at the prospect, exclaiming, ‘But you hardly get any food! Sure there are eight courses! But everything’s so tiny!’ I myself am somewhere in between and it really depends on the type of restaurant.

To get a good tasting menu, the restaurant needs be one that serves light food and facilitates that wish of wanting to try a bit of everything. Coming along to the Namaasté restaurant in Camden, the first thing I noticed about their tasting menu was the price. At £45, it was markedly cheaper than a lot of other tasting menus and the cost included matched wines.

There were seven courses to get through, starting off with the Kadhai spiced pan seared scallops, served with mango and charred tomato salsa. This was a refined start to the meal with the mango and salsa making a neatly-matched combination with the scallops. The accompanying Chablis was an accommodating wine to have and was a good match.

Following up were three more starters. The first was a Tandoori Portobello mushroom. When it was put in front of me, I was reminded of that voice which complained about the size of the portions. But although it was a little small, it was quite accomplished, marinated and filled with figs raisins, green chilli and homemade cheese.

The second and third courses of coriander lime chicken tikka and Peshwari lamb chops respectively were well flavoured and went well with the Lombardia and Santenany Blanc wines.

Finally it was time for the main course and the chance to get something that would not be finished in more than three bites. I plumped for the Rajasthan Laal Maas, spicy lamb with roasted red chillies served with pulao rice. This was a scorching dish and it was a bit of a struggle to get it finished. It was a strange change of pace from the previous courses but not without its merits.

After the lamb, the meal veered once again. Seeing a selection of British cheese brought along after such a fiery course was a little strange. However, the choice of goat’s cheese, stilton and cheddar was welcome. It was all finally finished off with a delightful passion fruit cheesecake, which was accompanied with sweet Jurancon Moelleux.

Namaasté’s tasting menu features a sumptuous collection of dishes. The match-up with the wines has been made expertly and at £45, it offers supreme value for money.

Namaasté Kitchen
64 Parkway
Camden
NW1 7AH