I visited a premier Wolverhampton restaurant to try a new spin on traditional and rustic food with a kick

The restaurant on Cheapside has been acknowledged as one of the best in the country, with two AA Rosettes, a continued presence in the AA Restaurant guide and the Hardens certificate of achievement among its achievements.

Since 1980, it has produced food which is rich and full of flavour, with each ingredient intricately added and cooked to a set standard and always fresh to provide a menu full of authentic Bengali cuisine.

The owner Mo Khan is someone who prides himself on the high quality of the food and the service provided, but who also likes to challenge himself to produce new menu items from different areas of his Bangladeshi heritage.

Having added several new vegetarian meals to the menu in January, which have proved very popular with customers, Mr Khan has taken inspiration from his familial home in the north of Bangladesh for his newest creations.

I was invited to come along and try the new dishes he had created from what he described as the type of food someone would want to eat after working in the fields all day, then returning home, so travelled over to the restaurant, which is always warming and welcoming and, on a weekday evening, was keeping busy.

After being treated to fresh poppadum's with the homemade chutney, red sauce, mint yogurt and fresh salad, the starter arrived and was eye-catching, to say the least.

It was described by Mr Khan as a Bengali flat fish, cooked with mushrooms and a range of ingredients, including shallots, mustard seed, tamarind, tomato, olive oil and garnished with a bay leaf.

It was an impressive sight, full of colour and with a strong and rich smell, and the first bite just highlighted the different ingredients, with the mustard and tamarind adding a little bit of a kick, and it was just a delicious dish.

That was a great way to start the meal, with a nicely spiced and very rich flavour to it, and was a good precursor to the main dish, something Mr Khan promised me was the hottest dish he’d ever made.

I do like a hot curry (not in terms of heat level, but nice and spicy and full of flavour), so I was keen to see what he had come up with, particularly after he had told me about how that part of Bangladesh was an area where people loved their spicy food.

The main course brought fresh garlic naan bread, saffron rice and, alongside my curry, a dish called Aloo Dhom, which consisted of potatoes and peas in a rich and tangy sauce and which was a nice counterpoint to the spice I was about to ingest.

On that note, my Mirchwangan Masala was a colourful dish with red, green and burgundy colouring present and a strong smell emanating from the plate it was served on.

At this point, I was introduced to my dish by Mr Khan through a curated description of what it was, consisting of mutton, which was used due to the strong and earthy spices being used on the dish.

Said mutton had been marinated with dried, roasted and crushed red chilli, yogurt, fresh lime, black peppercorns and balsamic vinegar, then cooked with fresh roasted cumin, coriander seeds, cloves and black peppercorns along with onions and red cabbage.

The combination looked spectacular, but the proof is in the tasting, so I waded in and took a big bite of a piece of mutton.

The spice doesn’t hit you immediately, but the mutton is so soft and so well-seasoned that it didn’t matter when I got the first wave of spice as I was enjoying the meal so much.

All the ingredients go together really well to produce a meal which has a powerful flavour and which does raise the heat level somewhat, meaning that you experience this curry through the chilli in the mutton and the endorphin rush that gives you.

It really was a very good curry and one which, as a person who regularly uses hot sauces, carries a good heat and a strong kick, one which can catch you unaware if you aren’t expecting it to kick in.

I was full of heat and spice, but feeling much better as a result, with the rice and naan acting as good sides to counter the spice and give me a proper and full meal, finished with some homemade ice cream.

The Bilash has been one of the premier restaurants in Wolverhampton for four decades, but has not rested on its laurels. The owner is a person keen to try new things and pay his respects to his heritage and homeland, and these dishes are a prime example of how creative he can be.

If you’re looking for something different, traditional and with a sense of heritage and nostalgia, you should try the Mirchwangan, but make sure you have a cold drink to go alongside it as it does have just a bit of a kick to it.