Streat Graze & Bar, Stone

Streat Graze & Bar in Stone serves up tasty, generous portions inspired by Indian street food. With an emphasis on tapas style eating, it’s a great place for sharing. You won’t find the familiar curries of traditional British Indian restaurants here, but good value dishes, some with a bit of a twist.

No one could accuse me of jumping on the bandwagon and only being interested in the latest thing. That applies to just about everything, not only eating out.

The truth is, I have a whole list of places in Staffordshire and around that I haven’t been to yet but whose food I want to try. Yes, some are relatively recently opened. But many are longstanding that I just haven’t got around to. Living here for around six and a half years now, I’ve still a lot of ground to cover.

STREAT GRAZE & BAR

Streat Graze & Bar on Stone’s Radford Street is a case in point. It’s been open since late 2018 but I didn’t go there until a couple of weekends ago.

I could have gone to Streat‘s newest incarnation: a branch on Church Street in Newcastle-Under-Lyme, opened just last month. But no. Contrary as always, I decided to visit their Stone bar and restaurant.

The owner of both Streat restaurants is Mo Yousaf. He’s also the proprieter of Mojos in Stone and Planet Bollywood in Stoke.

Streat describes its food as being inspired by ‘the streets of Asia’.  This explains the name, a neat union of street and eat. Obvious once you know, isn’t it? I’ve also seen it written as Str’eat, which I guess makes it a little clearer.

MENU & PRICES

As you might expect then, much of Streat’s offering is in the style of tapas; small plates of food which are ideal for sharing and ‘grazing’. You can also just go in for a drink rather than a meal or snacks.

There are a few Mains (salmon, chicken, burger), but the majority of the menu is split into Small Plates, Starter Plates, Sharing Platters (including a fun sounding ‘Tiffin Box Food Roulette’ with items chosen by the chef), plus Sides and Salads.

Myself and companion ID chosen a selection to share.

First off, a quick note about the prices and names of dishes. What you’ll see in this post are those which appeared on my bill. You might find prices and names for dishes slightly different on the website and possibly the paper menu in the restaurant.

WHAT WE ATE

INDIAN NACHOS

This first dish, I knew I wanted to try even before we arrived at Streat. I really fancied Tex Mex Nachos (£4.90) and was definitely going to have some.

ID declared (BEFORE he’d tried them, mind you) they sounded ‘weird’. Okay, I’m weird. But tortilla chips topped with spicy chicken and lamb mince plus peppers and onions and melting cheese was exactly what I fancied.

Turns out I was right.

The only ‘Tex’ element in this dish were those nachos. And they were very unobtrusive flavourwise, allowing the spicy minces to shine through. But I loved the crunch they brought.

There may have been cheese in there, but it wasn’t particularly noticeable. What there was were a trio of fresh and tasty sauces. Minty yogurt, sweet-sour tamarind and another (the pinky-orange one) I’ve get to identify.

I loved all the flavour and texture combinations of the dish: meaty, crunchy, spicy and fresh.

If you still think this is inherently wrong, a fusion nightmare, you might be interested to know that the dish reminded me of the very Indian Grazing Platter we ate at Kitchen Chronicles last month. That featured crispy dahi puri and sev puri along with juicy elements and tamarind chutney. The two dishes had remarkably similar flavours and textures.

So please don’t discount Tex Mex Nachos. You might just love them, as I and ID did.

PANEER PAKORA

In contrast, our next dish, Paneer Pakora (£3.90), was very simple. The fresh, squeaky Indian paneer cheese came in a generous portion. Cut into long oblong shapes, it was coated in a bright red and nicely spicy batter then deep fried.

A little dish of minty yogurt (not pictured) sat alongside for dipping.

Not the most exciting dish maybe, but simple, straightforward and with a nice kick of chilli heat.

SAMOSA

Talking of meat, something I did particularly like at Streat was that several dishes included chicken mince. You don’t see that too often and I thought its lighter taste made a pleasant change from the more usual lamb or beef.

This was shown to good effect in our dish of Kebabish Murgh (£4.90).

There were two substantial sized grilled chicken seekh kebabs in the bowl, topped with a spicy tomato and vegetable masala sauce.

The kebabs were cooked just right too. Not at all dry, but no alarming signs of being underdone either. The spices in both the meat and the sauce were well balanced with medium heat.

At under a fiver, I thought this a great value dish.

MASALA FISH

If you’re looking at Streat’s online menu, this dish is called Desi Fish Bites. On my bill it says Masala Fish Chunks (£5.90).

But I don’t give a hoot what it’s called. This was another outstanding plate at a great price.

We got three substantial pieces of white fish, deep fried in a wonderfully crispy coating with a touch of spice. As I hope you can see from my photo, the batter was beautifully light, brown and crispy with no hint of greasiness.

As for the fish, I don’t know what it was but it tasted like superbly fresh cod. Although this was the most expensive dish we chose, at under £6 that still seems a bargain. Anyway whatever it was, like the batter, the fish was expertly cooked, being moist and flaky.

These wonderful, golden morsels came with a dish of that sweet-sour tamarind sauce for dipping and a garnish of lettuce and a little onion chutney.

SIDES

Among the sides, there’s various forms of potato, rice and veg. We shared a couple of them.

First off, here’s Lightly Spiced Wedges (£2.90) which came in a good-sized portion. Nicely fat and golden, the spicing was definitely light. But they were good for mopping up the final bits of tasty sauce from all our dishes.

Our other choice was Chaat Salad (£4.50) and I’d say this was the one dish I was slightly disappointed with.

Although the paper menu on the night gave no description, the online menu says this has ‘chana, daal’ as well as leaf, tomatoes, onions and paneer.  As you can see from the photo below, what we got didn’t resemble that. It seemed more like a combination of House Salad or Olives & Paneer (both shown as £3.90 on the online menu).

There was nothing actually wrong with the dish, but I wouldn’t have chosen to order it. At £4.50 I don’t think it was particularly good value either. Especially when you consider that the very good nachos, samosa and kebab dishes each sell for only forty pence more.

Perhaps you feel I’m being a bit picky at these prices? But if you’re also one of those people who look online to get an idea of which dishes to choose, do be aware of inconsistencies and ask your server about any dish you’ve set your heart on if it isn’t described on the menu.

SURPRISE DESSERTS

Moaning over, I’m pleased to now be able to tell you about some goodies at Streat which AREN’T on the menu.

There appeared to be just two desserts, a brownie and a mango and coconut lassi. However, after our dishes had been cleared away, owner Mo Yousaf came over and, hearing that we did want dessert, asked ‘what do you fancy?’

After going upstairs to check with the kitchen, Mo came back and to our delight we found we could have a traditional Indian dessert.

I went for Gajar Halwa (£3.90) which I hadn’t had in many years. Made from carrot which is slowly cooked in sweet milk with ghee and cardamom, usually with nuts added, this is a real treat. At Streat it had a lovely delicate flavour and wasn’t too sweet either.

A splash of cream over the top was nice, as was the scoop of refreshing mango ice cream alongside. But I think the chocolate drizzle was an embellishment that wasn’t needed, the halwa being so good.

ID chose Jalebi (£3.90). Even if you haven’t eaten jalebi, you’ll have seen them if you’ve been in an Indian sweet mart like the ones I used to go to in Leicester, the bright orange coils sitting in shiny heaps.

Jalebi are made by squirting lines of a batter which includes gram or chickpea flour into hot oil. After deep frying, they’re immersed in a sugar syrup.

The result, like those at Streat, is a sweet both crispy and juicy. They’re generally a little too sweet for my taste but ID enjoyed them served with a scoop of that mango ice cream.

RECOMMENDED

Without drinks, our food bill came to £39.70 or just under £20 per head.

I think that’s very good value for the quality of the cooking, the ingredients and the generosity of the portion sizes.

My only minor criticism regards that salad, which didn’t live up to my expectations.

Maybe I’m a bit of a pedant, but I’d like to see the online menus and those in the restaurant marry up with what you’ll see on your till receipt. Some of the dishes on the paper menu didn’t have a description at all, but I think each item probably needs one.

I’d also like to see Streat shouting a bit more about those fantastic desserts. Maybe a few tabletop chalkboards with the day’s choices? We’d almost decided not to bother with dessert, and it was only when the owner came over that we got to hear about them. I would’ve hated to miss that halwa!

But there’s not a lot to quibble about at Streat.

As a lover of Indian food, I found their style a refreshing change. The tapas sized portions are also a great way to try lots of different dishes without spending a huge amount, especially if you’re a group.

I guess now I’ll have to get around to visiting that Newcastle-Under-Lyme branch.

Recommended.