A standout lunchtime exclusive. Finely spiced minced meat (usually lamb or chicken) in a rich sauce, served on warm buttered toast. It's the kind of simple-sounding dish that becomes iconic when executed perfectly. Reviewers specifically highlight this as a must-try if you're coming at lunch. It doesn't appear on the dinner menu, which is why lunch feels different here.
Tips from diners
This is lunchtime-only — it doesn't exist on the dinner menu. If you want to try it, come during lunch service Mon-Sat 12:00-14:15.
Moist, well-cooked chicken suspended in a sauce infused with fresh methi (fenugreek) leaves. The sauce is wonderfully rich, the fenugreek providing a subtle bitterness that elevates rather than overwhelms. It exemplifies Asma Khan's approach: careful spicing that enhances the central ingredient rather than masking it. This is a main that anchors many meals at Darjeeling Express.
Tips from diners
The methi chicken showcases Asma Khan's careful spicing philosophy. The meat is moist and the sauce wonderfully rich — reviewers consistently highlight this dish.
Street food reinterpreted with fine dining technique. Crisp, hollow shells arrive filled with a mix of potato and chickpea, and you're given tamarind water to pour in just before eating. The shells burst when you bite down, flooding your mouth with cooling tamarind, the starch of the potato, the earthiness of chickpea. It's meant to be eaten whole and fast, before the shells absorb too much liquid. Reviewers call it life-changing because of how the flavours burst all at once.
Tips from diners
Pour tamarind water into the hollow shells just before eating. Pop the whole puri in your mouth immediately before the shell gets soggy — the burst of flavor is the point.
Handmade steamed dumplings with pleated edges, filled with minced chicken and spices. They arrive soft and pillowy, best eaten whole with a dipping sauce of chilli oil or tamarind. Reviewers describe them as moreish — you eat one and immediately want another. The filling is carefully spiced, the wrapper texture is delicate. They're a bridge between Asma Khan's Himalayan influences and her Indian cooking.
Tips from diners
Eat the momos whole with chilli oil or tamarind dipping sauce. They're moreish — order extra if you're sharing.
A Bengali dish featuring large tiger prawns in a coconut milk sauce. The curry is mild and creamy, designed so the prawns stay the focus. They're cooked precisely — no rubbery overshooting. The coconut adds richness and sweetness that balances the heat from chilli. Reviewers note the restraint: the sauce serves the ingredient, not the other way way around.
Tips from diners
The prawn malaikari is a mild, creamy Bengali curry where the prawns are perfectly cooked. The coconut milk sauce is restrained to let the prawns shine.
Chef-owner Asma Khan built Darjeeling Express on cooking from her Kolkata and Mughal ancestry. The all-female kitchen team creates vibrant, carefully spiced dishes — methi chicken, prawn malaikari, tamarind dhal. No fusion. The lunch menu is à la carte and excellent (keema toasties are lunchtime-only). Dinner is a set royal thali for £65. Nestled on the top floor of Kingly Court, it's bright and plant-filled. Asma's approach was featured in the Netflix documentary Chef's Table.
Lunch is a completely different experience than dinner. It's à la carte, the keema toastie only exists at lunch, and the menu has dishes dinner doesn't offer. Lunch Mon-Sat 12:00-14:15 is worth planning around.
Dinner is a set royal thali for £65 — you don't choose courses, you get a curated progression of the kitchen's best dishes. It's the chef's vision. Dinner Mon-Wed 18:00-20:30, Thu-Sat 17:00-20:30.
Always book ahead — the space is small and always busy. Even on a quiet Wednesday, an early dinner slot fills quickly. Book on OpenTable or call.
The restaurant is on the top floor of Kingly Court, which is tucked off Carnaby Street. It's bright and plant-filled, nothing like the buzzy street-level shops below. Worth arriving a bit early to find it the first time.
Asma Khan was featured in the Netflix documentary Chef's Table: Volume 6. If you've watched it, dinner becomes an experience of tasting what you saw on screen — her home-style cooking philosophy is exactly what you'll experience here.
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