Review: Darjeeling Express, Soho

We’ve been eating a lot of good South Asian food recently. From Dastaan to Trishna via Paradise and the Chilli Pickle, and now we’re on the Darjeeling Express. Which was my favourite? That’s very tough. Each had at least one dish that was an absolutely knock-out spectacular feast of spice and flavour, and each had at least one dish that was just jolly good. Quite brilliantly, none of these five meals had a single duff dish. South Asian food in the UK is absolutely epic right now.

Darjeeling Express is upstairs at Kingly Court. It’s a casual space with tables for two nuzzled together cheek-by-jowl. We got in at 6pm and it was lovely, but by the time 7:30pm rolled around YOU VERY MUCH. HAD TO SHOUT. AT EACH OTHER. TO BE HEARD. So it’s all very delicious and friendly, but not the venue for a leisurely romantic dinner.

The putchkas we started with (pani puri elsewhere, unless an expert can explain to me the subtle difference?) were excellent. The tamarind water was clean, deep flavoured and nicely fierce. The shells crisp, the filling earthy. The two mutton kebabs that followed were absolute bliss. Soft but extremely full-flavoured mutton mince, given a massive hit of smoky pungency with the generous use of black cardamoms. The yogurt and mint filling cut this nicely, as did the sweet chutney.

Oh… big shout-out to the Darjeeling Express puri! Huge puffy balloons that collapse into the most delicate and delicious flaky bread. It’s just the perfect spoon for shovelling delicious curries into your mouth.

Even bigger shout-out to the maddest dish! Mirchi ka Salaan is, quite literally, curried chilli peppers. Adding chillies to a curry, sure, we’re all familiar with that. But this is a dish of chillies, curried! Bonkers! And delicious. It kinda defies description, except to say that it was surprisingly easy to eat… and yet after a few forkfuls… it felt as though someone deep inside me was just slowly dialling up my body’s thermometer from “comfy” to “hothotHOT!”

There was also a goat curry, with some very sturdy pieces of excellent goat meat in a dry sauce. A sweet aubergine curry with a lot of peanut in the sauce; splendid, with a much more south-east Asian feel to it. And a dal… blissful… with a great grunt of earthen flavour, quite possibly the most flavoursome dal I’ve ever had.

So we loved our dinner at Darjeeling Express, in spite of the noise level. Food will be around £30 each. Their cocktails are good, their masala chai has a really big kick of spice, and their lassis aren’t bad. If it wasn’t necessary to book 3 months in advance for a table, I’d definitely be back!