ANY homemade attempt at curry tends to run the culinary spectrum of agreeable spicy mush to cultural abomination; eating out, I am probably the kind of diner Sanjeev Baskar had in mind when he thought up Goodness Gracious Me’s famed "going out for an English" sketch.

You know the one, where the party of Indian diners goes to a UK restaurant and requests the blandest thing on the menu, ponders scampi, and orders far too many portions of chips. As Homer Simpson would say, it’s funny because – often enough – it’s true.

That’s not to say I don’t love the stuff, but up to now I’ve kind of been playing Indian cuisine by ear.

So the concept of Mayur, a new "five star" Indian restaurant, in the East Village complex, on Duke Street, was an immediately appealing one.

Opened in the last few weeks by a family of doctors, the ethos is one of high-quality food served in a healthy way, and what’s not to like about that?

Walking in, the first thing to notice is the contemporary decor – lots of lavish purple and brown, chandeliers, and a stylish (and expensive-looking) take on the much maligned flock wallpaper favoured by more traditional UK curry houses.

We paid a visit on a week night at relatively early doors, and found there was already a number of families eating.

The restaurant later attracted groups including students, older couples, and groups with babes in arms.

There were as many people wandering in off the street in shorts as there were those that had booked and dressed for the occasion, and all received a warm welcome from the front of house staff.

The menu is vast and offers a variety of alternatives to curry – although red meat lovers should be warned there is no beef on the menu at all because the owners are Hindu. It instead focuses on chicken, lamb, fish and seafood, and vegetarian options.

Papads (£1.50) are served in a style more like that of a hard taco than the usual giant discs of fried poppadoms, and staying with the accompaniments for a moment, the garlic and coriander naan bread (£2.25) that was soon to follow was less the recognisable floppy, doughy variety, and was instead light, chewy and crispy and more akin to an Italian- style garlic pizza.

Two papads were served with the usual chutneys, with the coriander and mint option particularly good.

For starters, I chose the chandni chicken tikka (£4.75) and my companion opted for the gilafi seekh kebab (£5.50).

Both were served with an unusual but crunchy and moreish salad of beansprouts, carrot and onion, which were ideal for sharing as the generous meat chunks of each dish were easy to swap.

Both were definite hits and left us ready for more – the chicken was soft and delicious, the lamb was lean, not the least bit greasy, and left a light, spicy aftertaste.

Choosing the mains againthrew up raised many tempting choices, including lobster and crab dishes.

But we went with the Patrani sea bass (£12.95) and lamb rogan josh (£11.50) with a serving of pilau rice (£2.25) and the garlic naan to share between us.

The whole steamed sea bass seemed to be proving popular with other diners, too, and, served wrapped in a banana leaf and smothered in a coconut, sesame, coriander and mint rub, looked impressive.

The fish was incredibly fresh and perfectly cooked, served again with the beansprout salad. In hindsight, I probably could have done with a vegetable side order and wish I had sampled some gobhi mater (cauliflower and green peas with ginger and lemon).

The classic curry and the fluffy, chewy pilau rice was also a success, with generous chunks of lean meat in a creamy yoghurt-based sauce that again looked wholly appetising and not greasy.

The naan came to the table wrapped in tin foil to keep it heated, which seemed like a bit of a strange touch given the surroundings.

For a curry, the price may have seemed somewhat expensive to some more seasoned aficionados, but we concurred that it was no more so than a main course in any other restaurant of Mayur’s quality.

Until this review, I had lived in blissful ignorance of the scope of traditional Indian puddings, which is why I was so glad I tried the gulab jamun (£4.50), described as a hot milk dumpling and served with vanilla ice cream, and which is to be seriously recommended.

Creamy, comforting and an irresistible combination of hot and cold, it was the sort of dish that makes you wish you could go into a restaurant just to order dessert.

vickyanderson@dailypost.co.uk

Notes

Mayur, Duke Street, Liverpool

Tel: 709 9955

Menu: Healthy twist on Indian cuisine

Decor: Contemporary and up-market

Child friendly: Definitely

Service: Good

Value: Worth the little extra cost

The bill: £57.10 (including two rounds of drinks)

Disabled access: Yes