While Dishoom is closed due to covid restrictions on restaurants, they’ve launched delivery through Deliveroo.
This service will be available until 25 October, and potentially beyond, from noon until 11pm every day, in postcodes “from Murrayfield to Northfield, Newhaven to Morningside”. Just enter the postcode on the website to see if you’re on their delivery route.
They will join a huge contingent of Scottish restaurants who are offering delivery and takeaway while closed or unable to open fully, see our list.
Expect an edited version of their menu, with “Bombay comfort food (and other sundries)”.
It features dishes including their ever popular house black daal, which is cooked for 24 hours, and the favourite of Irani cafes, keema pau - spiced minced lamb and peas with a toasted and buttered home-made bun and garnish.
As in the restaurants, for every meal ordered for delivery, they donate a meal to a child. They work with Akshaya Patra, a charity in India which provides nourishing free meals to schools. This means the children are undistracted by hunger, and ready to learn.
As well as the Dishoom food delivery, there’s merch. They can drop off a copy of their Slip-Disc CD, for some Sixties Mumbai vibes.
Or, there’s the hardback cookbook, Dishoom: From Bombay with Love, which was released last year and written by co-founder, Shamil Thakrar, who owns the chain, along with other branches in London, Birmingham and Manchester, with his cousin, Kavi.
Unfortunately, due to the practicalities of biking a gallon of liquid to somebody’s house, they won’t be delivering the unlimited chai that they serve at breakfast and brunch. However, you’re welcome to brew up a cauldron at home, with the help of our recipe.
There are many varieties of chai. The kind we make at Dishoom is the sort of spicy, sweet chai you will find at Bombay’s innumerable tapris (street stalls), normally poured with great dexterity and skill from arm’s length into a small, stout glass.
Serves 4
2 tbsp loose Assam or Darjeeling tea, or 3 English breakfast teabags
1½ tsp black peppercorns
12 cardamom pods
2 cinnamon sticks
50g granulated white sugar
500ml whole milk
Put the tea, ginger and spices into a saucepan, pour on 1 litre boiling water and bring to the boil. Lower the heat and simmer until you can smell the spices, about 10 minutes.
Add the sugar and milk, turn up the heat and bring to the boil. Allow 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. (A skin will form, but this is strained off at the end.)
Taste to see if the chai is to your liking; boil a little more if you wish for a stronger flavour. Patience will be rewarded.
Extract taken from Dishoom by Shamil Thakrar, Kavi Thakrar & Naved Nasir (£26, Bloomsbury). Photography © Haarala Hamilton.
A version of this article first appeared on The Scotsman.
