REAL RICH BAR & GRILL — Restaurant in Tendring

I have travelled to lots of different places. Whilst I love to try local cuisines in different countries, one thing has  remained consistent : you can ALWAYS get a decent curry.

I have been to Denmark, eaten stegt flæsk, yet still stopped off for an incredible lamb jalfrezi. I have been to Malta, enjoyed rabbit and peas in gravy but still found time for a banging chicken dhansak.

But tonight I found an exception to the rule.

During a stay in Clacton-on-sea, I looked around for local restaurants and found Real Rich Bar & Grill, an 'authentic' Indian eatery with a massive 4.8/5 on Google which was 100 meters from my hotel. "Incredible" I thought. "Get your coat, wife. We are in for a treat".

We walked the short distance to the restaurant and climbed the half-a-dozen steps to the front door only to be confronted with a big sign which said "Sorry but we are closed". We stood there confused for a bit, but then saw a member of staff inside and tried the door, which opened. I really wish we hadn't.

We were greeted by a waitress, who was very friendly. I told her that the sign outside said that they were closed. She looked at me blankly, then told us to sit wherever we wanted.

We initially sat by the window, but it was freezing and draughty. So we moved into the middle of the deserted restaurant.

The waitress came over and took our drinks order. I asked for a beer, my wife wanted a Pina Colada from the cocktail menu.

10 minutes later, the waitress came over and said that the Pina Colada wasn't available. So my wife ordered a Malibu and diet Coke instead. Another 15 minutes later, her drink arrived - a wine glass filled with pineapple juice.

Looking at the menu all this time, we noticed that it was odd. Usually Indian restaurants tend to have different curries of differing styles and heats. But everything on the menu seemed to be incredibly tame... spinach chicken, butter chicken, chicken korma, and anonymous 'lamb curry' without any further description.

We ordered the 4 starter sharing platter to begin with. For main, I asked for lamb bhuna and pilau rice. My wife asked for spinach chicken and plain rice. I also asked for a garlic naan, but these weren't available for some reason.

The starter wasn't too bad. Fried paneer, onion pakora, samosas and spring rolls (which was really odd for an Indian restaurant). This came with 4 dips, two of which were tomato ketchup and Daddies brown sauce.

When the mains arrived, mine could have been described as 'lamb fat marinated in oil'. My wife's spinach chicken was a bowl of unidentifiable green goo. None of it was even remotely spicy. This was accompanied with rice and a salad which consisted of peeled, sliced cucumber, raw carrots and a lump of lemon. It was all inedible.

The bill came to £62.84 (including £4 for the 'Malibu'). I paid £63 and I am still begrudging the 16p tip.

I have honestly been happier to pay for certain parking fines that I was to pay for this tripe.

Avoid at all costs....

We went 2 weeks after it first opened, we walked up the steps went to the left and thought it was shut? The worst entrance ever, we should have known it wasn’t going to end well. we were sat at the worst table, behind a wall by the window! Eventually when we had 2 waitresses trying to take our order, we decided to get some poppadams for something to kill the wait for the main course. Eventually when the poppadams arrived they were so bad! You could literally see the oil they were cooked in. So we decided to use our napkins to soak it up, the dips were weird also. Everything was so un Indian. We never purchased any drinks. I never made a fuss I pulled a man who looked like the manager at the bar & explained that if you can’t get a poppadam right and the girls working never had a clue we weren’t going to stay any longer. My wife said not to write this review, maybe it was just early teething problems ? After reading the reviews I can’t believe what I’m reading. I even said when I spoke to the man in charge that we would come back in a few months when they sorted their teething problems out. Surely it couldn’t of been just us? Apparently it wasn’t as another person was unfortunate to spend £60 odd pounds for his experience, Avoid this place it will seriously...

This place is a hidden gem. Recently opened, it is a charming family run restaurant.

It is not the usual "Curry House" type place, and this is a good thing.

Meals were freshly prepared to order and full of flavour. It was also nice that both the meals we ordered were very different from each other. I've lost count of the times I've ordered different dishes in an Indian restaurant which are all very similar.

The pilau rice was very tasty and different from other's I have had.

Food portions are generous and of good quality.

They are not licensed for alcohol, so it's BYOB.

Service was very friendly.

The best Indian meal I have had in...