Milestone birthdays by candlelight

A birthday dinner here lands in a room that is already doing half the work: low light, candles on the tables, old films running silent on the wall. We seat up to 32, with another 10 at the bar, and the whole place can be yours.

The room after dark

Evenings start at four and get warmer as they go. The films play without sound, so nobody is shouting over a television, and the bar keeps pouring while the table lingers. It is a good room for a long dinner and an unhurried round of toasts.

Up to 32 sit down together. Past that, standing suits it better — 50 to 55 with hors d’oeuvres passed through the room — and a full buyout puts both the dining room and the bar in your hands.

The ten seats at the bar come with a private booking, and they earn their keep: people drift over between courses, and that is where the Indian Spiced Old Fashioned gets built. It is usually where the party is still standing at the end of the night.

Ordering for a table this size

Most birthday tables take shared starters and one entrée each. The kitchen sends out chilli cheese toast, samosas, chicken tikka and seekh kababs while people are still arriving, then everyone gets the curry they chose with rice and naan. It keeps the table talking instead of waiting.

If half the party doesn’t eat meat, that is straightforward here: the vegetarian side of the menu is as long as the rest of it. Our chicken and lamb are halal, and the menu also includes pork, so the kitchen is not fully halal — if anyone keeps strict halal, tell us and we’ll steer the order.

Cake and the last hour

Bring a cake and we’ll plate it at $6 a guest. If there is a bottle you have been saving for this particular year, corkage is $30 a bottle for anything not on our list. And if you would rather the kitchen closed the night, the Dark Chocolate Cricket Ball arrives warm, which tends to end an evening well.

There is one more thing a birthday can do here. Every night from 10 pm we serve a hot meal to anyone in need, and a sponsored meal is $7 — a decent thing to add to a night that is already about someone.

The dinner menu most birthday tables start from: Everything on it can be swapped, and the allergy menu lists what every dish carries.

The Seated Dinner

Shared starters, then one plated entrée each

To start, shared

• Chilli Cheese Toast
• Vegetable Samosas
• Munkey Chicken Tikka
• Lamb Seekh Kabab

Entrée, one each — plated, with rice & naan

• Garden Club Vegetable Korma
• ‘Portu-Goan’ Pork Vindaloo
• Butter Chicken Tikka Masala
• Malabar-Coast Shrimp Ruby
• Kashmiri Saffron Lamb

Sides, shared

• Mum’s Lemon Daal
• Roasted ‘Gobi’ Cauliflower
• Gunpowder Potatoes

Dessert, one each

• Gajar Halwa à la Mode
• Dark Chocolate Cricket Ball

Add on

• One signature cocktail, beer or glass of wine per guest

Pricing on request — tell us about your event.

Tell us about your night

Tell us the date, the headcount, and whose year it is.