"They need to evolve' Curry houses feel the heat from modern rivals

Britain’s love aff air with curry goes back centuries, long before the boom in the late 1970s that led restaurants popping up everywhere. Well into the 90s and 2000s, going for a curry, mopped up with naan bread and washed down with a beer, was a Friday night staple.

- Jessica Murray

But in recent years the traditional British curry house has been in decline, and the Balti Triangle in Birmingham, once home to many balti restaurants, has only four remaining .

“I have been quite vocal about this for years, telling the curry hospitality industry that they need to adapt and change and evolve,” said Aktar Islam , the founder of the Michelin-starred Indian restaurant Opheem . He added: “There was a massive explosion of what we now refer to as British curry – which was inspired by cuisine from the Indian subcontinent but in reality had very little resemblance to its counterpart in India – but the problem with the model is that it never really changed with the times.

“It started off with oversaturation, but the market is being shared as we’ve now got so many other cuisines as well and they’re not keeping up with it, and I would say that is what has led to the decline of the curry industry.”