Wide view down the dining room between long tables at Aara

Our story

From home kitchens to Icknield Street

Family recipes, a live tandoor and dum pots that are never hurried.

Aara didn't start in a restaurant kitchen. It started at home — with pots of slow-cooked biryani sealed under dough, tikkas marinated overnight in the fridge, and curries tempered the South Indian way: mustard seeds, curry leaves, patience.

Those family recipes travelled from home kitchens to a corner of the Jewellery Quarter, where we opened the doors on Icknield Street. The room is warm and casual — long tables, soft light, the smell of the tandoor — and the cooking is anything but casual.

Every tikka is marinated a full day before it meets the flame. Every biryani is layered by hand — saffron basmati over marinated meat — then sealed and slow-cooked in the dum style, so the steam stays in and does the work. Our curries are homestyle: coconut, tamarind, poppy seed and dry spice blends roasted fresh. We use halal meat, and there are plenty of vegetarian dishes across the menu.

Aara means coming home to the table. That's what we cook for — every plate, every guest, every day.

At home by the window

Muted loop — it plays without sound

The family

It started with cooking for people we love

Aara is a family kitchen that grew into a restaurant — and it still behaves like a family kitchen. Children of friends lean on the window ledge and watch the street; regulars get asked how their week was; nobody is rushed off a table.

That's the hospitality we cook with — the same pot, the same patience, whether it's Tuesday lunch or a full house on Saturday night.

On the doorstep

The faces behind your table

Short, muted loops from Icknield Street — honest people moments, not kitchen craft.

  • Your host, on the doorstep

    Muted kitchen loop

  • The Aara family

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  • The team behind your table

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  • On the Icknield Street step

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  • All the warmth of home

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Behind the pass

Craft you can watch

The tandoor runs all day and the curry station never stands still.

A chef lifting skewers of tandoori chicken from the clay tandoor
Chefs at work over the curry station pots
The chef smiling as he pulls sizzling skewers from the tandoor

The family

The people behind the pots

A small team that cooks like it's for family — because around here, it is.

A member of the Aara family at a table laid with dishes
Hosting is part of the recipe — expect recommendations, the occasional extra dish, and someone who remembers how you like your biryani.
A slow-cooked curry being stirred in a large pot
Slow pots and fresh tempering — dals, kormas and Andhra-style fries built in layers, never all at once.
The Aara team gathered at the restaurant entrance
The whole team — front of house and kitchen — on the step of 108-109 Icknield Street.
Aara's dining room — light wood tables, warm lighting and framed art

Come sit at our table

Sunday lunch with the family, a mid-week tikka fix, or a full biryani feast on a Friday night — the room is warm and the pots are on.

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