Spices of Bengal in Ashford

Pretty Decent; Not Too Shabby To Be Honest Staff Member Khalique Was A Slacker & Couldn't Do His Job Properly Though Grading; 3/5 7/10 C

Loved the food, staff are really friendly and accommodating. Excellent value for money. Highly recommended

After driving past this restaurant for years we finally decided to eat here. Thoroughly enjoyed our time with a set meal and really friendly service.

Amazing food and brilliant service

In 2017 I said I would never get food from here again after a dreadful, very expensive experience. On the assumption that after 6 years the chef may have changed and the quality improved I relented and a take-away for three was ordered. We 0rdered 4 poppadoms. Only 2 were put in the bag although we were charged for 4. We should have received 10% off for a takeaway over £20.00 - this wasn't deducted. To add insult to injury within three hours of eating I was struck down with a horrendous stomach upset which lasted most of the night. I had eaten Lamb Pubally which was cream based, and the lamb certainly didn't taste like any lamb I've ever eaten. Another dreadful experience, and this time I DEFINITELY won't be going back.

Very nice food, reasonably priced, very friendly staff. Would recommend

Actually it was a take away we ordered .. the prawn Balti was was more of a vegetable than prawn as only 2 prawns were included in the dish as opposed to mainly vegetables .. the prawn puree ordered was another disaster as the pancakes were very heavy and very greasy that you couldn't eat them and the prawns were so overcooked they tasted like rubber. In fact not really sure that we got the Balti at all. All in all would never order food from this place ever again.

Best curry house in Kent. Always consistent and always busy. The marks of a good restaurant. Dishes are always adaptable and the service is always top notch - the best

Excellent meal, nice friendly service, well done

I went for a takeaway. The place is very clean. The staff were very polite and well presented. The food was excellent and reasonably priced. This my first time and will definitely return in the near future.

First visit and really enjoyed the curry we had. Good service and views. Would go again or have takeaway and recommend.

Decent Indian. Don’t be put off by the location or what it might look like from outside. Food and service really good. We went in about 630 on a Tuesday and it was half full with locals by the time we left

A warm welcome greets everyone whether eating in-house or buying a takeaway. The staff are attentive and welcoming and service is quite prompt. The restaurant is very pleasant and comfortable with views across the countryside. There is very good comprehensive Bangladeshi menu with other items for varied tastes eg vegetarian. All the dishes I have tried are delicious and well presented and very reasonably priced. There is a good selection of drinks both soft and alcoholic. A good test of their quality is that they are frequented by local people. I have been a regular for many years and heartily recommend the Spice of Bengal.

The best Indian food ever. Seriously...There were 6 of us and not only was the food amazing but so was the service. The Biryani was the best my mum had ever had..

This is, hands down, the best Indian/Bangladesh restaurant in the Ashford/Faversham area. The food is always cooked to perfection. Highly recommended for an authentic experience and wonderful food.

We had a take away, fantastic food and very quick service. Excellent value for money, would highly recommend.

Very good food, with good portions and good service Food on the expensive side, along with drinks being expensive too.

A lovely restraint serving a wide variety of Curry's and traditional Indian side dishes. There is plenty of seating and ltables to choose from. The restraint is decorated well, with aunimants scattered around, including an aquarium with tropical fish. The staff are friendly, and the service is quick. The views are spectacular, overlooking rolling hills and the countryside.

Lovely people but the food has gone downhill with little in the way of spicing .....perhaps they have a new chef??

Extremely friendly & helpful staff. Food incredible

Walked in ordered a takeaway when I saw him write down 4.95 for pilau rice and 4.50 for a naan bread I walked out

Great food, great service & local to where we live.

Always great food and friendly staff 😊

Met up with friends for a meal. Extremely well laid out. Probably didn't choosevthevrighr meal for myself, but that is totally down to my lack of knowledge of the meals. Would visit again

Food is great but be careful of the drinks prices £6.50 for a pint and £3 for a small orange juice from a standard carton of orange juice. I get prices have increased but that’s ridiculous. Won’t have a drink whilst waiting again. Such a shame!

Portions are really quite small but cooked and presented beautifully. For value for money as quite expensive, I think the meat, fish portions should be a little bigger. Really nice quinine though. Top mark.

Great value for money food was lovely and staff were very attentive

Friendly staff, always happy to help. Great food and decent price.

Excellent well cooked Indian food, wide choice of dishes, friendly staff, lots of parking, highly recommended

A friend and I visited and everything went well, great food hot and tasty with great chatty service. We finished the meals and sat there and sat there and sat there, 20 minutes later after we decided they wanted us to leave, there was no offering of a sweet menu or a coffee, not even a bill. I got up and paid then left. What a let down!!.

Always friendly and great service with very good food. Thank you

Super meal for six of us. Not busy . Booked for 7.30pm, rather slow so left at 9.45pm. £33 per head inc drinks. Very happy. Cheerful staff ,tasty food.

We went for an evening meal with friends Very good meal including gluten free for my husband Staff very attentive

Excellent local Indian restaurant, reasonably priced and friendly atmosphere.

Excellent Indian food, really enjoyed my lamb Archar Mossala! Nice Bombay potatoes too! One of the staff was a bit snobbish, but the rest of them were very friendly and helpful! Would come back!

Friendly staff & lovely flavours. Beware that the portions are big! We were recommended to this place by locals and they weren't wrong. An especially nice touch were the slices of orange at the end to clear the palette.

Service amazing and the food exceptional

Friendly staff and absolutely delicious food. Really was fantastic and we will be back for more soon!

We arrived at The Spices of Bengal and immediately what struck me was it seemed as if we had been transported to the Eastern Indian Sub-continent with lovely views, Excellent place to put a Restaurant. As soon as we walked in we couldn't believe our luck the decor was very much like a Indian Working Mens Club which my interior designer friend tells me is the latest look (felt very privileged). The service was excellent and the staff were very polite. My friend who considers him self a bit of a Chicken Dhansak expert said the Curry hotness was spot on. The Naan Bread's were literally the right size for the meal, all to often they are very large and so much is wasted. The price was literally spot on if i could of paid less i would of but that was down to the company i had (Chat was a bit boring lots of quite uncomfortable silences) and hand on heart i couldn't take that out on the restaurant hence quite happy to pay full amount in the end. I couldn't give 5 stars as i felt the fish tank could of been a bit cleaner and out of the 5 of us that went 1 of us had an up set stomach so a 20% hit rate (Not bad)

Relatively new in the area we took our visiting friends to the Spice/Spices of Bengal for the first time. We all noted the outside of the building looks as though it is listed for demolition and then found the inside decor to be Indian Working...

Extensive menu, draught Indian beers, very nice food, good portions, polite and friendly staff.

Great food try it for your self

Our regular trip to this restaurant with family was I think thde best yet. Absolutely amazing food. Can't beat it. Always love coming here. If you've not been here be sure to check it out.

Lovely staff, homely setting and the most incredible food! Honestly the best Tarka dhal we've ever had & the garlic chicken Tikka Bhuna was sooo good. Highly recommended!

Ordered several meat and vegetarian curries and dishes, as well as sweet and garlic naans. The Sag Aloo was the crowd favourite, followed by the butter chicken. There could have been more prawns in the bhuna (or perhaps we should have ordered more than one...

Pleasingly situated and spotlessly clean. Strongly flavoured freshly made food and very courteous service. Well worth a visit.

Just had another fantastic takeout curry from there

Lovely food friendly staff excellent service and take away.

Wonderful food, fresh and hot. Staff are always very friendly and helpful. They have a nice chat and actually care about you as a customer. Prices are very reasonable, with great portion sizes which offer value for money. We will be coming back again for sure.

We have been getting takeaways here for many years, the food is always great, we have never had any complaints. The staff are kind and welcoming, it is always a pleasure to see them. Thank you!

We often eat at The Spice of Bengal and reading a review on service I cannot believe that the service would be poor. We have always had excellent food and the service is always the best every time we go. The owner is very friendly...

We have been coming to this restaurant for some years now. I have worked at the Royal London Hospital where brick lane was a onion bhaji throw away so spoilt. However the Spice of Bengal offers first class food, honest, tasty with the menu having...

We have just returned from a Tuesday Banquet meal at Spices of Bengal. We arrived just after opening at 6pm and got a lovely table and warm welcome. For £12.95 you get a starter, main course, one side, either a naan or rice and a...

Despite storm Dennis we decided to go to Spices of Bengal last evening, and we were very glad we mad3 that decision excellent food, served with thought and care.

Great food and very welcoming staff- drinks are a little on the pricey side but views and service and general atmosphere make this a great place and a worthwhile treat.

Food was mediocre. The £5.50 they charged for a pint of coke! (which I personally didn’t ask for a pint measure) the fact they charge for a side that we hadn’t ordered that they had taken away. Didn’t want to have an argument over the...

This is an annual event for old friends and we always get the best attention from the lovely staff and the food is excellent and good value

Food here was absolutely brilliant. I love an extremely good Indian meal and this one was served excellently. The taste was unbelievable and exactly to my liking. Chicken was soft and tender and so tasty. One small thing which stopped me giving full rating was...

My son and I dined here recently and it was very good. The food was very good and the service friendly and professional. It is a more traditional type of Indian restaurant but we would recommend.

I have returned to Charing after some time away and after a hard day unpacking, called them late. They said no worries and as I arrived a little early, got a drink on the house and a sit on the comfy sofas of old! Always...

I frequently this curry house many times over many years ,Alan has always been a top manager/ Owner, but the last few years the place has gone down hill dramatically, very,tired interior dirty, worn out , staff sitting at tables texting when we entered the...

Wij zijn vanavond voor het eerst hier geweest maar het eten was gewoon heerlijk !! Zeer vriendelijk personeel en uitgebreide keuze qua eten .....als u hier in de buurt bent dan kunt u hier gerust eens gaan eten

Naast het het aquarium met uitzicht over de omgeving lekker pittig Bengaals gegeten voor een redelijke prijs. De bediening was correct en vlot.

In many years I have only had one meal which was not good or even superb.Last night was wonderful with well spiced good quality ingredients and excellent service despite being full.,It is worth a visit if only for the views from the top of Charing Hill, mentioned in the books of H E Bates and one James Bond book but the main reason is the superb food and friendly service.When the grandchildren were young they were treated with equal attention.

Our favourite curry house recently closed down and having had a few hit and miss experiences with others we were recommended Spices which was excellent. The lamb was lovely and very tasty as were the prawn puri starters. Looking forward to our next visit.

We had a fantastic meal here, the car park tells you everything when you arrive, it was packed, as was the restaurant. There is a small bar area where I think they would welcome you popping in for just a drink, folks waiting for take away gathered her also. The place is a little dated and the bathrooms need refurbishing, but the staff were super friendly and the food is just amazing! We will be back...lots!!

We have been using The Spice of Bengal for over 20 years. The service is prefect the food is spot on every time. We had a take-away last night and it was wonderful as always. Just wanted to leave a review so other people know just how brilliant this restaurant is. N Gwillim

As usual excellent seeing and food amazing went for birthday will definitely be back in the new year with friends and family I didn’t finish and I took it home in a take out scrummy.

We had a takeaway and they were very helpful. When my friends collected the order, they were ushered in and offered free drinks and didn't wait that long. The food was excellent! I would recommend it.

I'm not a regular but I do go from time to time largely because I'm lazy. I've glanced at the reviews and in my experience, I have to agree with everything that has been written.

The curry was OK the service was absolutely rubbish, beer over priced, did not finish all my meal so asked to take the rest away, waited ages for the rest of my meal to be returned, waiter came up and said was it masala chicken, no it was the lamb dish, was made to pay then another 10 minutes later my meal was bought out I never checked, when returned home I opened the bag they had given me the wrong item, witch they new on phoning them they weren't bothered, if you eat there and you have left overs and you don't want them mash them up as I think they reuse your old curry I will never be returning,, sly gits

The food is lovely, great service, very welcoming and a lovely place to spend a night out. One of my favourite Indians so far.

Called to have a takeaway ordered 2 drinks first, a half of lager and a tap water with a dash of blackcurrant,we were charged £5.45 I was surprised at that so politely questioned it. I was told it was £2.95 for the lager and £2.50 for the tap water, which at all other establishments has never exceeded one pound. I expressed my disconcern over this at which the head waiter became very unfriendly and rude stating that he had rates to pay. This was not the worst of it he then went on to refuse to take our order because of us questioning the drinks price,he gave the excuse that his cooks were at the end of ramadan and were having their breakfast, but whist he was telling us this we watched food to continually come out of the kitchen and orders taken, he also informed us that there were plenty of other places to go. What a HORRIBLE miserable head waiter. Have we come to a stage where we as customers are not to question prices and if we do we are going to be punished for doing so. Awful awful attitude shame on you to treat people with such arrogance and rudeness just because they question a price maybe a lesson in customer relations may be in order. We have moved on now as to how we deal and talk to people now.

Would have given 4.5 if available. Very pleasant waiters service. Range of food good. This was not the banquet night which is on a Tuesday and looks good value at £11.95 per person. We had a selection of dishes which suited us as individuals, with a well received Korma for the mild friends and a good bhuna and jalfrezi for us with medium hot taste (including the chillies). Building nice and airy very comfortable. Lovely ambiance.

Family of 9 for a 21st birthday on the bank holiday Monday lunchtime.

We had a lovely curry here. The food was delicious, hot and fresh. The staff were very friendly. However, the toilets were horrible, not particularly clean and just tatty. They need to be gutted, modernised and re-tiled floor to ceiling. I noticed the actual restaurant was quite shabby too. It’s a shame that it looks like this but it is clearly a popular restaurant and customers are coming for the food and service which are the most important factors. It just need a little tlc.

Been passed many times. Decided to tack a chance and try. Wow, food excellent, atmosphere excellent. Waiting staff courteous and attentive. Reasonable price. All in all a great dining experience for myself and my partner. She said she fancied a curry so we decided to stop. Really glad we did. All food freshly cooked so the wait between courses was slightly longer than normal but well worth the wait. A really great dining experience and a great end to a long day out. First time but won't be the last. Would recommend.

Take away is great, eating in is better. Great food. Friendly service. Beautiful views across the downs. Have never had a bad meal here. Always greeted with a smile. Highly recommend.

I normally have a take-away with the family but have,over many years,eaten in. The food is good quality,freshly cooked with charming service. Their Tuesday banqueting evening is unbeatable value

Excellent food.excellent service and excellent value. this is not the first visit and am most certainly not disappointed!!

Nearly two hours from ordering and order not complete. Apparently very busy but two hours?? Will not recommended

Service and food always great here but pre-book for a w/e visit. Weekdays are best for an impromptu meal. Ask for the window seat as this offers some great views when the weather is good. The car park can get full if you book a later meal.

Great being able to choose from the majority of the menu, instead of a smaller version. Have been several times, and not been disappointed.

Tuesday night specials very well priced 4 of us went there for a meal and we will be going back...

Visited on a Thursday evening with family. Arrived at about 1930 and the welcome was friendly and had a choice...

Nos sorprendió encontrar un buen restaurante indio en esta pequeña y pintoresca ciudad de Charing, eran muy serviciales, buen servicio y la comida era realmente deliciosa.

Probé este lugar con mi marido, mi hermano y mi cuñada, porque todos disfrutan de un curry cuando juntos, y este era un sitio nuevo para todos nosotros.

Personal amable y acogedor y muy bien colocada en la cima de la colina. Aunque a veces el pollo es de cuero seco

This is the best Indian restaurant ever I feel, excellent meals and service and a fabulous take away service too.

Service was Excellent and Friendly - Food was nice, some of the dishes didn't have much taste and others were quite good. Courses were a little slow to arrive, not that it was an issue - but very noticeable. We'd go back again, but it wouldn't be in any great hurry.

Title says it all. Not the most tastiest of curries we have had. In fact some dishes were quite bland. Mushroom Bhaji was dry and I suspect past its best. Still, good location and staff helpful and friendly.

On Sunday 18th June (Father's Day) our family ordered a takeaway for six. We were told there would be a wait of 50 minutes. That actual wait was 70 minutes. The starters were ok, hence the two stars instead of one, although very expensive. £4.95 for a handful of mushrooms, £5.95 for half a dozen pieces of meat in the mixed starter seemed exorbitant. The portions of rice were much smaller, with small containers only three quarters full. However, it was the curries themselves that were a huge disappointment. We paid £13.95 for a king prawn madras, where there was a spoonful or so of smallish prawns in a container full of weak, watery liquid that was clear on the plate - nothing else. The Garlic Chicken Bhuna was pretty much the same. There were half a dozen reasonable chunks of chicken but the sauce was weak, thin and tasteless. Need I go on. Of the six mains ordered only one was eaten up, that being the chicken tikka which was not in a sauce. More than half of each main was thrown away. We often used this restaurant in the past but this will be the last meal we ever have from there.

We had a very pleasant evening with great food! The restaurant is located on a location with very nice views. A place to come back again, that's for sure.

Be it take away or sit down meal the food served is with a smile and always tastes good with good sized portions. The dining area is clean, light and area but dated.

Excellent from start to finish. Welcomed warmly and given choice of drink at bar or table. Lovely atmosphere in the restaurant, children clearly welcomed and were no trouble. Menu extensive but not overfacing, food beautifully presented and not one complaint from any of the group, delicious meal.Waiters attentive but not intrusive and owner, Alum, clearly cares that you have a good experience. This was not my first visit and it certainly won't be my last.

Went here last night (Tuesday), unaware that it is buffet night- don't be fooled by title as is not the usual help yourself to various pre prepared trays of food.. you actually choose a starter, main, vegetable dish and either rice or naan from the usual menu.Restaurant has attentive, but not intrusive, staff who immediately make you welcome.We went about 7pm and it quickly became busyThey offer takeaway service and we noted that they seemed to know a lot of the customers using this service, by name..We would definitely go again... couldn't fault it..

I don't often write reviews good or bad! But this place was the absolute worst. If you like bland and very tasteless food with lots of fake colour then this is the place for you! There is nothing Indian about this place and the food all tastes the same. We ordered the chicken tikka as a starter which came as a chopped up piece of meat. The marination was only on the top! So bland & flavourless with a deep red colour! For the mainI ordered a lamb Balti which I sent back as soon as it came, the lamb tasted off, and smelt awful. My partner ordered an chicken tikka masala, although the sauce was nice, he said there was something 'crunching' in the boneless chicken pieces! His butter naan also came soaked in butter, which he sent back, and I am sure they just drained the butter off and gave us the same one back! Overall, I wouldn't recommend this place. It's a complete rip off with no real chef, probably just some Micky mouse guy following basic cooking instructions! It's tasteless and not authentic cooking by any means! They are also bangali and not Indians hence their food represents nothing of Indian cooking. Absolutel sham!

Invited to an evening meal in the Spices of Bengal restaurant last night and was pleasantly surprised. The owner welcomed us in and was very attentive along with the waiting staff. Between the four of us we had different dishes and I have to say that the dishes were very very tasty. I personally thought that the lamb would have been slightly better if it had been slow cooked to make it more tender. The dishes themselves were of adequate size and, for me, just too much. We also had various types of rice and they were again, very tasty.My overall impression was that we had a very nice meal, in pleasant surroundings, with attentive staff and best of all, you are not rushed to eat your food. I would recommend giving it a go for a nice relaxing evening meal. We will visit again.

Myself and my son visited here last night. We often pass and although it's a little "out of town" it's often quite busy. We arrived without pre booking. We were greeted promptly and pleasantly. All our food was good as was the service. The dishes were good size portions. The restaurant setting is good and located at the top of a steep hill. Plenty of private parking. We thought the price was a little more than we normally pay locally. But it was all good and didn't disappoint. We will return.

Food was good, shame it took an hour to prepare our takeway order. Won't be going back anytime soon.