Matthew Norman reviews

Monday, February 20, 2012 - The food was consistently good, and with more rigorous attention to detail would be outstanding...Szechuan salt and pepper beef was superbly tender, and laced with a beguilingly potent sauce dominated by the tongue-numbing Szechuan peppercorn. Soft shell crab tempura was within seconds of being immaculately fried, but the crab's freshness compensated for the batter's minimal sogginess. The slight gaminess of blackened cod was more than neutralised by a delicious honey and soy dip.

Tuesday, August 23, 2011 - A quartet of sizzling tandoori lamb chops, alluringly covered with browned onions, tingled the tongue with ginger, garam masala and much besides. Three huge prawns, perfectly cooked to retain their meaty texture, bore the same imprint of freshly crushed spices...That quail was a revelation, the juiciest of meat in a thick and deliciously coriander-laden gravy. Haleem, a collation of seven types of lentil with steamed, ground lamb and crispy onions was a delight as much for its textural contrasts as the intensely gingery taste.

Monday, February 28, 2011 - Main dishes to come, and these proved as inconsistent as they were overpriced. Sweet and sour king prawns were firm and fleshy, and the sauce adequate if claggy, but charging 14 quid for six of them is dead cheeky. Chicken in a lemon-and-honey sauce was dry and lifeless; aubergine with minced pork in a yellow-bean sauce laden with flavour but too squishy; and Singapore noodles, although nice and eggy, stone cold...It pains me to say so after so many outstanding meals, but this Mancunian legend has become a paradigm of self-regarding complacency.

Saturday, December 12, 2009 - I was wincing at the worst glass of wine I've ever lacked the strength to send back (from a bottle of pinot grigio that must have been opened in the 80s) when 'a hotpot of slow-braised mutton shoulder & Cuan oyster with pickled heritage beetroot' (Lancashire hotpot in English) arrived. For 8.25, this wasn't so bad, albeit the gravy was watery and way oversalted, the meat astoundingly tasteless for mutton and the potato overcooked. At 16.50, however, it was a calumny.