Ariana Restaurant LONDON — Restaurant in London

If you’re Persian (as I am), you’ll be disappointed.

I’ve lived in the area 20 years and go here maybe once every 2 years if I am feeling desperate for Persian food, only to be reminded each time of why I should trek to west London for my Persian food fix. It is almost always a disappointment. (In the interests of fairness I had a nice joojeh kebab here once).

Today I popped in for a cup of tea with a friend and she wanted a small nibble on something so I suggested my favourite Persian starter (kashk-e-bademjan). The food arrived; and honestly it was awful. I tried a mouthful and thought it was bad. But I was hungry so tried a second mouthful and decided I couldn’t eat any more. My friend ate as a) she didn’t know what it was supposed to taste of and b) was also hungry despite the odd aftertaste. Even so we left half the dish.

I spoke to the waiter afterwards and said it was not good. (Because the “kashk” part of the dish in fact was not what it is meant to be - it was diluted with yoghurt) and the main part simply tasted bad. In Farsi we would say it tasted of “zogh” which is a bit like rotten eggs or the smell dishes sometimes get when they come out of the dishwasher and there isn’t enough rinse aid).

Anyway the waiter just came back with the bill. Which we paid. I then went to speak to the owner as the waiter had nothing further to say about the food; not even an apology.

I told him we had paid for the food but I was unhappy and wanted to give feedback. First of all he told me that I would have been paying for the food anyway whether I liked it or not; so that was a moot point that I was making. (Wow! Nice way to get the customer on side).

He then challenged me on why I thought it tasted bad, telling me he’s been the chef and owner for 20 years and this is how he’s always made it. I told him I’ve never had HIS “kashk-e-bademjan” before but it didn’t taste like any version of it I’ve ever had before. Regarding the bad egg taste/ dishwasher taste he told me that the dishes are all washed so I have no concerns there. My point wasn’t that the plate smelt but rather that the food tasted bad, but he didn’t seem to care.

In the end his dismissiveness and rudeness meant I just walked away, it wasn’t worth my time to try and discuss anything with him when he clearly had already decided not to take on board my feedback.

In conclusion; the food is not reflective of good Persian food (based on all the times I’ve eaten here) and based on today’s experience the service...

Shockingly bad service and food. Could be the worst restaurant in London. Great option if taking an enemy for dinner!

I organised a dinner with friends here based on reasonable reviews. They couldn't be further from the truth.

We were offered a seat at the back of the restaurant, which was offered to someone else whilst we sat there waiting for it. After a handful of requests we were finally given a table.

Waiters in the restaurant should be given an award for most miserable staff in London! We were so polite and friendly yet it would have been easier to get blood out of a stone than a smile or even a passing show of enthusiasm. I wonder if they were being kept hostage?

After almost 30 mins of trying to get someones attention we finally ordered drinks. The waiter was literally acting as though he was signing his life away to us as scribbled 2 diet cokes and a bread basket. After another 20 mins we received our bread and had to remind them about our drinks. It was £22 for 4 bowls of dips and a bread basket! Dips were bland and about as exciting as an office lunch.

After 2 friends joined us we again had to try for 10 mins to get the attention of a waiter. A lady came over with pretty poor attitude, again everything felt like the biggest chore. We kept the order simple with 2 mixed meat platters and an afghani rice. Food arrived 20 mins later, we were then given the smallest starter plates to eat our mains, thankfully a drinks order was taken.

The meat was tasteless and boring with the addition of 5 random roast potatoes, which even aunt Bessie's wouldn't have been happy about. The qabuli pilau was also an absolute shocker, bland, oily rice, lamb had no flavour.

After finishing the meal we tried to get a waiters attention for 10 mins with no luck so we had to go up to the counter for the bill. We flagged to the manager that we didn't have a great experience and that we waited a very long time, his response was to look around to the 6 or 7 tables and say its a very busy night, no apology.

Having worked in the restaurant industry for 15 years and eaten in 100's of restaurants across London I can happily say this is by far one of the all time worst. If this is the state of Afghani food in London then there's definitely room for competition.

Was it a bad night? Seemed to be service as normal. Please do yourselves a favour and don't waste your time or money. Even with the 'Eat Out' discount this was the most regrettable restaurant visit...

Having a Persian family, this restaurant had only half-met my expectations. Now I'm not a fussy eater usually, but as a frequent consumer of Persian cuisine, this restaurant did not meet up with what was expected.

We had ordered a mixed grill and two full dishes, as well as a starter bowl of yoghurt, humous, aubergines and fresh mint with feta cheese. Right from the beginning, before even tasting it, you could clearly tell that the humous would not be good. It was very orange in colour and also very liquid, much like a thick soup. The mint and lemongrass was indeed fresh and the walnuts were delicious and young. The feta cheese was also of decent quality. The bread was made fresh when you ordered it so that was the best part. Now onto the main meals.The rice was pre-fried in oil, (which I've never heard any true Iranian doing) and so this caused the rice to be very very greasy and also undercooked. The kubideh had far too much onion in it and was not minced enough. There were too many large chunks which was not pleasant to bite into. The grilled chicken did not seem grilled at all, it was far too 'wet' and the taste of the spices was not what I'm used to. The atmosphere itself is alright, it does have a nice seating area in the back with a 'garden' of some sort. Being a relatively new restaurant, it was slightly overdone on the decorations and had too many random items, for example, most of the decor was Afghan/Persian but then there was a boats steering wheel for some reason? One big thing that also put me off was this: we went around 12:30 for lunch and so the place was not busy yet. Our table was situated directly in front of the reception and so the waiter would constantly stare at us. This was especially annoying when you were eating.

The value for money was definitely not one of the best I've been to, but overall it is a good experience, just expect to pay upwards of £90 for 4 main meals and...