Beyond Tikka Masala: A Foodie's Guide to Sylheti & Bangladeshi Regional Specialities

Why Britain's favourite curry isn't really Indian

Walk into almost any "Indian" restaurant in the UK and the family behind the kitchen is, more often than not, Bangladeshi — specifically from the Sylhet division in the country's north-east. Sylheti families have run Britain's curry trade for more than 50 years, and yet the regional cuisine they grew up with is still one of the country's best-kept food secrets. Tikka Masala, Korma and Vindaloo dominate the menus, but the real Sylheti larder — wild citrus, mustard oil, dried fish, naga chilli — rarely makes the front page.

This guide is a deliberate counter-weight. If you have ever wondered what truly authentic Bangladeshi food tastes like, what shatkora actually is, or why Sylheti slow-cooking produces such a different curry from a North-Indian Punjabi kitchen — this is the foodie's tour. Everything below is cooked in our Richmond kitchen at 16 Ashburnham Road, TW10 7NF, with the same family recipes Mr Syed brought from Sylhet in the 1980s.

Where Sylhet sits on the map (and why it matters)

Sylhet is a hilly, tea-growing region bordering the Indian state of Assam. Its food culture is shaped by three things: tropical rainfall, fertile river valleys, and a long Mughal influence from the north. The result is a cuisine that is generous and earthy rather than delicate — bold spices, dark gravies, hand-pounded pastes and one-pot curries built for large family meals. It is closer in spirit to Bengali home cooking than to a Punjabi tandoor menu.

Shatkora — the citrus that defines Sylheti curry

Shatkora is the ingredient that turns a curry from "Indian-style" into unmistakably Sylheti. Picture a thick-skinned wild citrus, somewhere between a grapefruit and a bitter lemon, with a perfume that survives an hour of slow cooking. The peel is cut into thick wedges, salted, then folded into a slow-cooked lamb or chicken curry where it perfumes the gravy and gently breaks down the meat.

We bring shatkora in specifically for our Chicken Shatkora and Lamb Shatkora — there is no Western substitute, and you will not find it on a generic high-street curry menu. If you have never tried it, this is the single Sylheti dish to order first.

The Sylheti spice cupboard

• Panch phoron — a five-seed Bengali blend (fennel, fenugreek, nigella, cumin, mustard) tempered in hot mustard oil at the start of a curry to perfume the base.
• Mustard oil — sharp, pungent and slightly sinus-clearing when raw, mellowing into a nutty depth once heated past its smoke point. It is the defining fat of Bengali and Sylheti cooking.
• Naga chilli — one of the world's hottest chillies, grown in the Sylhet hills. Used sparingly to lift a curry rather than to torch it.
• Shutki (dried fish) — a deeply savoury seasoning rather than a main ingredient. We hold this for private catering on request.
• Fresh-ground masala — every spice blend at Jaflong is ground in-house daily. The oils released in fresh grinding are what supermarket spice mixes simply cannot match.

Five Sylheti and Bangladeshi dishes worth ordering tonight

1. Chicken or Lamb Shatkora — the headline dish. Medium spice, slow-cooked, built around the wild Sylheti citrus.
2. Chot Poti — a Bengali street-food starter of cubed potato and chickpeas in tamarind sauce, finished with onion, chilli and fresh coriander. A vegetarian way in to Bangladeshi cuisine.
3. Sylheti Naga Curry — for adventurous palates. Fiery, aromatic, deeply fragrant; we cook it to your spice tolerance.
4. Chicken Achanak — Jaflong's exclusive signature dish, developed by our head chef over 40 years. A medium-spiced cream and herb curry that is unavailable at any other restaurant in Richmond or London.
5. Tandoori platters — Bengali-Mughal influence in their purest form: yoghurt-marinated meats char-grilled in the clay tandoor.

Sylheti cooking, served in Richmond since 2008

Jaflong Tandoori has been the Sylheti standard-bearer in Richmond, Ham and Twickenham for 18 years. Every dish on the menu is halal-sourced, prepared in a nut-free kitchen, cooked to your chosen spice level, and delivered across 11 South-West London postcodes.