I joined Cambridge Curry Community regular Stuart for a curry at Tandoori Palace the other night. He mentioned during our meal that he thinks that Royal Bengal in Willingham may be the most overlooked Indian restaurant in Cambridgeshire.

Thinking about it, he was right. Time and time again I get a faultless experience from the team at Royal Bengal and I know many others who get exactly the same. Yet, for some reason or another, it gets glossed over when people ask for Indian recommendations in the Cambridge Curry Community.

It was my wife and I’s 9 year anniversary. We have recently had a beautiful baby boy who has only recently turned 1. As much happiness as he brings us both, he limits our ability to pop out for a romantic meal between the two of us. So, we decided to grab a takeaway and make the most of it at home. As Willingham is a short drive away from my house, I decided to pop in and reaffirm Stuart’s theory.

As I popped in, I was immediately greeted by the team and waited for my order. I was treated to a complimentary half pint of Kingfisher while I waited. The food took a little longer than anticipated so we ended up chatting about all the different Indians in Cambridgeshire…my favourite subject. After a while, it came up that it was my anniversary tonight and just like that I was presented with a lovely bottle of white wine.

Now that is customer service!

Our order was as follows…

• Chicken tikka masala

• Lamb tikka vindaloo (hot)

• Saag aloo (side)

• Mushroom rice (x2)

• Peshwari naan

Upon first inspection, the food looked fantastic. The vindaloo especially had a lovely brown colour to it and the saag aloo was generously covered in spinach, with a lovely golden tint on the potatoes. The chicken tikka masala was looking a little fluorescent and the rice a little colour washed but otherwise everything looked the part.

First of all, YES, I am aware that I have had a vindaloo only last night. Don’t judge! 🤣

The vindaloo was absolutely perfect. Not just the colour mentioned above but the big and juicy chunks of lamb and the nice fiery kick that followed. This is how a vindaloo should be done! It tasted superb and ticked all the boxes for a top quality vindaloo.

The rice was a very generous portion, in fact, there was slightly too much by the end and I had to leave some on my plate. This was a stark contrast to my meal at Tandoori Palace last night where I had to bulk it out with saag aloo.

The saag aloo was PERFECT. As mentioned previously, the spinach portion was generous and the potatoes had a lovely colour but most of all, it had a really deep flavour. It actually took me by surprise as you rarely get a saag aloo with such a deep flavour. I’m not entirely sure how they managed it but whatever they did really worked. It was one of the best I have had in a while.

My wife had the chicken tikka masala. She thought that the curry was nice and creamy with chicken that had been tikka’d really well. The picture gives off an almost oily look but she was adamant that it was “not even remotely oily”. My wife is a woman with high standards and it ticked all the boxes for her.

The peshwari naan was fairly standard and ordinary. It was by no means offensive but served its purpose well enough. It was soft and heavy with a respectable amount of peshwari inside.

Thinking back to Stuart’s comment, he is absolutely right. This is the third review in a row where the Royal Bengal gets top marks from me. From now on, I am going to make sure that the Royal Bengal gets the recommendation it deserves.

Thanks for reading!