Where Banglatown eats beyond the curry house, and what to order
Home cooking, sweet counters and snack spots at the Banglatown end of Brick Lane and along Whitechapel Road, with an order for each.
By Only Shoreditch Editorial
The curry house is not the whole story of Banglatown. If you want Bangladeshi food rather than the standard British-Indian menu, walk south from the Shoreditch end of Brick Lane towards Aldgate East (this is E1, in Tower Hamlets, not Hackney) and look for home cooking, sweet counters and snack spots. Confirm hours before you go: they vary by source.
Why the street looks different now
At its height in the mid-2000s, Banglatown had around 60 Bangladeshi or Pakistani-owned curry restaurants and cafés, according to Beyond Banglatown. The curry restaurants have declined fast and now sit alongside Swedish delis, French patisseries, pizza parlours and vegan cafés. That makes the places that cook Bangladeshi food for a Bangladeshi crowd easier to spot, and worth the detour.
Sit-down: Graam Bangla and Amar Gaon
Graam Bangla, 68 Brick Lane, E1, is the closest thing here to a beyond-the-curry-house restaurant. Its own site says it has served Brick Lane since 1997 and describes slow-cooked kala bhuna and bhortas (mashed dishes), plus a Bangladeshi fish spread. Its website is the place to start. A Tripadvisor reviewer calls it real Bengali cooking rather than the usual British-Indian range. Order the kala bhuna, or look at the bhortas. Tower Hamlets Slice reports it hosted King Charles in February 2023.
Amar Gaon, 50 Brick Lane, E1, calls itself a restaurant shop selling Bangladeshi dishes and sweets, and says it was founded in 2010. The menu leans on Sylhet and Dhaka cooking, and chingri bhuna (prawn bhuna) is the dish it features. Its website has the menu.
Sweets and tea: Rajmahal Sweets
Rajmahal Sweets, 57 Brick Lane, E1, is a sweet and savoury shop. It sells Bangladeshi sweets, samosas (lamb included), a lamb kebab roll, Bombay mix, Bangladeshi biscuits, Turkish delight and baklava. Reviewers single out the karak tea. Yelp marks it as cheap. Listed closing time is 23:00 but opening times differ between directories (somewhere between 09:00 and 11:00), so check before a morning visit.
A note on the word: mishti is the Bengali for sweets, mithai the Hindi spelling. Tower Hamlets Slice describes the sweet counters as busy all year, with Ramadan and Eid the peak, and sweets as a gift custom. It also says second-generation businesses are moving towards cafés and sit-down dessert shops. The artist Laisul Hoque won the East London Art Prize for a tribute to Bengali sweets, and the same piece is a good read on the sweet shop scene.
A short walk further: Kolapata
Kolapata, 222 Whitechapel Road, E1, is a Bangladeshi restaurant and snack spot, not strictly Banglatown, and a walk beyond Brick Lane. The Good Food Guide’s Dina Begum named it her go-to for an evening snack in her guide to Bangladeshi bites around Brick Lane. Reviewers on Yelp and Tripadvisor recommend fosca (panipuri or phuchka), kala bhuna, kacchi biryani and hilsa. Yelp puts it at the middle price band.
What to look for on a menu
- Kala bhuna: slow-cooked, the dish Graam Bangla puts up front.
- Bhortas: mashed dishes, also at Graam Bangla.
- Haleem: a beef and lentil dish, with aloo bokhara (sour plum) chutney.
- Chomchom and kalojaam: soft, milk-based, syrupy sweets.
- Firni: ground rice pudding.
- Gurer chai: milk tea with date molasses.
These last dishes come from the Good Food Guide piece, which is the best starting list if you want to order beyond chicken tikka.
Practical
Start at the Shoreditch end of Brick Lane and walk south. Sweets first if you want to graze, then a sit-down meal at Graam Bangla or Amar Gaon, then on to Whitechapel Road for Kolapata. Prices were not available for most of these places, so ask before you order. Ring ahead if you are going at an odd hour.
