Shimla – Clonsilla, Dublin 15

5 Weavers Row, Clonsilla, Dublin 15.
01-8249988

Oh to have a birthday celebration break up the monotony of day to day life!!
It’s nice to have something to celebrate and as we were going for a meal with my man’s parents (his mammy’s birthday) we let them decide where we were to go for dinner.
They decided on Shimla in Clonsilla. It was closed for a good while for refurbishments after fire closed them down and they reopened recently. My man’s parent’s have been there more than once and wanted us to try it. It’s Indian food, we love Indian food so we were very excited!! However, excitement became disappointment as the evening progressed. The décor was lovely although the room was darker than I usually like. The atmosphere was good for a normally quiet night of the week.

The menu is very long. Long menus scare me. How can you cook so many meals well? Also, if a menu is long, it tends to lack information on cooking methods, ingredients and spiciness which some may find exciting, but not me. I like to be tantalised by a menu before I order. I don’t find any joy in looking at the name of a dish and not being given any idea what they heck it is or what’s in it. This flying blind thing works in some restaurants (ones that you can guess what a meal consists of eg: fish and chips) but in an Indian, Thai, Chinese, Italian or Spanish restaurant you rely on description, description, description.

The service was friendly but a little slow to clear plates and the waiters tended to reach across our food as we were eating without saying anything which, in my opinion, is rude. We were presented with poppadoms and various dips before our meal but, surprisingly, these dishes weren’t cleared away when the starters arrived, even though everything had been eaten. I got a stuffed pepper to start. I do not like green peppers. They’re insipid and they taste like unripe banana skins. So of course, the pepper came out and…… it was green. Sighs No matter, I am a soldier…… so I soldiered on, as there are very few things I absolutely will not eat – I like to be proven wrong about an ingredient.

The lamb filling was sparse but pleasantly spiced. But the green pepper itself was bitter and oily. My King Prawn Madras wasn’t nearly as spicy as I had requested. I always ask for extra spice as I find some Indian restaurants can dumb down spice for the Irish palate, much like Italian food. They take one look at a little Irish girl asking for extra heat and they give me a “look”. The sauce was thin and there weren’t very many prawns in it (and they didn’t look big enough to be king prawns either). The bindhi (okra) was bland and the spinach in the dish made it slimy. A not at all pleasant texture. But the highlights were the Chicken Tikka Biyriani, Lamb Rogan Josh & the Chicken Dopiaza.

For side orders we got Peshwari naan (the menu described it as having sweetcorn inside so I was intrigued). There was no corn in the bread and it was lacking in flavour. But my Garlic naan was delicate and delicious. The Pilau rice was completely bland. There were spots of turmeric yellow here and there but it looked to me like the spice had been thrown in at the last minute in clumps (without any other spice) and hadn’t had time to infuse and flavour the rice. The wine was delicious. Two €22 bottles of Australian Syrah did the trick. I can only speak for myself of course so for my meal, the price did not match quantity or quality. In saying all that, I’d give Shimla a second chance to redeem themselves.

Food: **
Atmosphere: ***
Price: **
Returnability: ***

Excellent ***** Very Good **** Good *** Fair ** Poor*

Tags: Bhindi, Byriani, Chicken, Dopiaza, Garlic, Green Pepper, Indian Food, Lamb, Naan, Peshwari, restaurant, Rogan Josh, Shimla