Before we get started on the countdown of Reading’s 10 best dishes – apologies for the delayed start time, by the way, and for keeping you all hanging – I just wanted to say thank you for the fantastic response I’ve had to the series of posts to celebrate 10 years of the blog. I’ve had terrific feedback, some lovely mails, people contacting me to say they’ve made a pilgrimage to check out one of my top 50 dishes, all of the engagement has been marvellous, and very touching. One Reading restaurant who will remain nameless even dropped me a birthday cake, would you believe.

I now plan to celebrate the birthday properly – for the last time, I promise – at the forthcoming ER readers’ lunch and then I’m off on holiday. So you may see a couple of weeks without a post, but I’ll be back before the month is out with new reviews from strange and exotic new places (there’s this town called Swindon, you know – have you heard of it?). Anyway, without further ado here is the top 10. I hope you enjoy it, I hope it contains at least a couple of surprises and I hope it helps you build up a list of places to visit, or reinforces how much you like your own favourites.

10. Pistachio adana, La’De Kitchen

My recent visit to La’De Kitchen established two things in my mind. One was that it wasn’t quite the restaurant it used to be, which is a bit of a pity. But the other was that it still boasted, in the form of its mythical pistachio adana, a dish that on its day could beat almost any other in Reading. It’s a glorious lamb kofte with bulghur wheat and salad, and what used to be a crust of crumbled pistachio has morphed, for the better, into something like a rich, bright green pistachio pesto which renders the very good sublime. Worth the price of admission alone, and worth a journey out to the suburban splendour of Woodley Precinct.

9. Dak-gang jeong, Soju

I raved about this dish back in 2018 when I visited Soju (or The Soju, or whatever it’s called) and I put it on my end of year list. And then, in truth, I forgot about Soju completely: I always had a list of restaurants to review and when I revisited anywhere it was usually one of my cast iron favourites. Somehow, that was never Soju.

Yet when I was putting my long list together, this dish nagged at the corners of my mind. If it was as good as I recalled, it belonged in the 50. But was it as good as I recalled? So Zoë and I went back to Soju about three weeks ago. The restaurant is in the middle of expanding to the room next door and feels a bit like eating in a big empty room rather than eating in a restaurant.

But this list is about dishes, not restaurants, and the Korean fried chicken at Soju isn’t as good as I remember. It’s miles better. It succeeds where Market Place newcomer The Bap fails, because it’s not just bland sweetness but it has the force and complexity of well deployed gochujang. It sings with the stuff, and in truth it’s every bit as good as the sadly departed Gurt Wings’ JFC. I wish I’d had a portion to myself, which isn’t a mistake I’ll make again. With all due respect to my future mother-in-law, a fully paid up member of BTS’s Army (it’s all about Jimin, apparently), this is one of the best things to come out of Korea.

8. Gobi manchurian, Clay’s Kitchen

One to add to the long long list of “Clay’s will ruin other versions of this dish for you”, their gobi Manchurian takes an Indo-Chinese staple and perfects it. The signs were always there that Clay’s was capable of this – back when they did a similar dish with baby corn it converted me, a lifelong baby corn hater, into an ardent fan. But really, this dish is at or near the pinnacle. Just enough sweetness, just enough heat, just enough crunch, just enough firmness in the cauli. 

If get all four of those things absolutely on the money at the same time you’ve created one of the best starters of all time. Simple, you might think: and yet only Clay’s manages all four. Gobi Manchurian elsewhere is either sweet or soggy or off-centre in some other way. If you’ve had it at Clay’s, you’ll notice that when you eat it anywhere else. But then if you have it at Clay’s, you might not bother ordering it anywhere else.

7. Ajika chicken wrap, Geo Café

I have been saying for years that Georgian food is the great undiscovered wonder of world cuisine, and it may be that I pop my clogs before that ever comes to pass. But, possibly uniquely in the U.K., Reading folk already know that because of the tireless efforts of Geo Café.

From street food to pub pop-ups to that residency on the Island, Reading’s weirdest venue, to respectability on Prospect Street, they have always been perfect ambassadors for the food of their home. If you’ve ever been to a supper club and heard owner Keti waxing lyrical about qvevris, wine and walnuts you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.

But even if you haven’t, even if you’ve never nibbled a khachapuri stuffed with gooey, stretchy cheese (or, like me, reheated it in the oven next day and – sacrilege alert – served it with Branston) you may well have had arguably their most revered dish, the ajika chicken wrap. Always chicken thigh, always smothered in ajika, Georgia’s hot, pungent, slightly acrid spiced sauce that expands your palate and horizons with every bite. Always mollified with the claggy comfort of bazhe, Georgia’s walnut sauce, the two components yin and yang in one of the best sandwiches you’ll ever eat.

If you’ve had one, you don’t forget it. If you’ve had one, you’ll have another. And if Geo Café ever pop up with their trailer at a street food event, order this dish there: the chicken coming off a hot grill, charred and indecently good, elevates a great dish still higher.

6. Boneless baby chicken, Bakery House

In the pantheon of Reading dishes, Bakery House’s boneless baby chicken has occupied a rarefied position for many, many years. I have been known to say that it’s the single best plate of food in Reading, the one dish that has everything you need without having to get sides or extras or whistles and bells. Since I revisited and re-reviewed Bakery House not long ago, to check in on it following its acquisition by the owners of House Of Flavours, I have ordered this dish a few times to check whether it is still as it was.

Actually, I did that the first time I went back. After that, I realised it was still exceptional and I ordered it every subsequent time because I loved it. It’s beautifully spiced, beautifully grilled, almost completely boneless and a joy in every single way. Sprinkled with just-squeezed lemon juice and stabbed with a fork, topped with spicy rice or a little of their impeccably dressed salad, dabbed with garlic or chilli sauce it is one of my favourite things to eat in Reading, or anywhere. Full stop, the end.

This piece is going up on Friday, and I had it on Tuesday. What more can I tell you? If Reading’s dishes were listed like buildings, this would be Grade 1.

5. Xinjiang shredded chicken, Kungfu Kitchen

I know what you’re thinking, another chicken dish? This is the last one, I promise. But it couldn’t be more different from the others in this top 10, and I have a particular passion for it which verges on the evangelical. It is, in its way, quite unlike anything else in the top 50.

This dish is cold, shredded chicken, like roast chicken in texture. And all it contains, apart from that, are chillis, cucumber, coriander, sesame seeds and a bright red spiced oil that clings to every nook and cranny of every component. This is a perfect introduction to the dark side of Jo’s menu, to Szechuan pepper that kills you with kindness, that turns up the heat but numbs the tongue so you carry on, as if compelled, until you’ve eaten it all. This dish is a brute. It will hurt you, ever so nicely, and you’ll find you like it. If I say more I’ll turn into one of those tedious food writers who talks about food as if they want to fuck the stuff, so I’ll leave it there.

Zoë can’t eat this dish, she says it triggers her asthma. All the more for me.

4. Deep fried fish in spicy hot pot, Kungfu Kitchen

Speaking of my fiancée, this is her favourite dish in Reading, and if you eat it after the Xinjiang chicken you’ll think it’s the blandest thing going. It’s not, but it’s an equally clever and fascinating set of Szechuan flavours, the deck shuffled and dealt ever so slightly differently. I don’t know how Kungfu Kitchen cooks fish as perfectly as this. It is crisp and craggy outside but inside it is only, only just cooked, soft and pearlescent.

It’s also hotter than the sun, and stays that way for a while when it reaches your table. If you order it along with the lamb with cumin (number 11, if you remember) the trick is to eat the lamb before it cooks through and then descend on the fish when it won’t burn your mouth. But if you have the restraint for that you’re a better human being than me. You’re probably a better human being than me anyway.

This has the same kind of heat as the shredded chicken, but it builds differently and reaches a calmer crescendo. It is, however, no less fascinating. When Zoë was discharged from hospital with Covid, we had a delivery of this the following night. When she devoured the lot, I knew we would be okay.

3. Thhicheko aalu, Kamal’s Kitchen

“You’re giving the number 3 spot to a load of old spuds?” said Zoë when I told her my final rankings. She said that firmly tongue in cheek, but besides she knows how much I love this dish. It was brand new on Kamal’s menu when he opened his new place and, for me at least, it was love at first taste.

These are pressed potatoes, and I’m not entirely sure what that means or how he does it, but they are flattened discs of potato with the perfect crunch and crust outside, the fluffy core within. You can have all the triple-cooked chips in the world, I really don’t care, but just leave me these. They come coated in a spice mix which actually has more in common with KFK’s Szechuan cuisine than you might expect, with that same medicinal numbing effect. I’ve never had a dish like this before, I probably never will again, but every day that Reading residents can walk into a restaurant and eat this is a day to cherish.

2. Chilli beef nachos, The Lyndhurst

At the start of this process, I said that only dishes currently available in Reading were eligible for the list. I said that was harsh on the Lyndhurst, because they change their menu so frequently. And since I started publishing this list, with two dishes by the Lyndhurst on it (beetroot croquettes and chocolate mousse, in case you’ve forgotten), the pub has rewarded me by announcing that they both come off the menu tomorrow to be replaced by something new. You couldn’t make it up.

I am confident they won’t do the same with this dish, because it has been on their menu since day one. It has survived every iteration of the menu, and in fact I had it when I first tried the Lyndhurst’s food, when I visited their new incarnation four years ago to review it. I loved it at the time, although I had some moaning quibble about it being messy. I was talking out of my arse: it’s a stone cold classic and I have enjoyed it many, many times.

I can’t remember if the Lyndhurst makes its own tortilla chips, but it feels like they do. If they don’t, they buy them in superbly. The chilli though, slow-cooked so every strand of beef is in high definition, is all their own work. So is the guacamole they adorn it with. I’ve always said this dish tells you everything you need to know about the Lyndhurst – they make this incredible chilli but just for one dish. They don’t stick it on top of a burger, or lob it on a baked potato, or serve it in its own right just with rice. They make an incredible chilli, day in day out, solely for this dish on the starters section of their menu.

And it’s too good to merely be a starter. You can have it as a starter, or you can have it to share, or you can have it as your main with a pint after a hard day at work, or you could just order it for a group of you because you’re down the pub, and still alive, and it’s a Wednesday. It still costs less than a tenner, which in itself is a bit ludicrous, and it has brought me an awful lot of happiness over four years. When they redecorated the pub recently they missed a trick not putting up a blue plaque.

1. Bhuna venison, Clay’s Kitchen

I don’t know what I can say about this dish that hasn’t already been said, but here goes nothing: when Clay’s launched in the summer of 2018 this was the dish that raised eyebrows, possibly the clearest statement of intent that, when it came to eating Indian food in Reading, you weren’t in Bangladesh any more. A bhuna, but with… venison? 

Clay’s social media, in the build up to their opening, explained that a bhuna was cooked in its juices and so was a drier, thicker curry than the gloopy soup people were used to in Reading, with its heavy reliance on tinned tomatoes and generic garam masala. But how could that work, a dry curry with venison which, for all its many merits, can be on the dry side itself? Well, be that as it may I remember visiting, eating it and thinking “no, they really know what they’re doing”.

And they really, really do. This dish, which has never come off their menu, which was the first name on their team sheet when they put together their Clay’s At Home menu, has become emblematic of Clay’s and its approach to food. Take something your customers think they know, and make it better. Use that stepping stone to introduce your diners to things further and further away from the known until, like climbing a mountain, you can look back and see where you’ve been. Such a beautiful vista! And yet the first step in that magnificent voyage was this dish.

And it really is stunning. I had it recently and it has stood the test of time like few other things (certainly better than I have). It is still rich, still complex, still tender, still poised and balanced. It is simply a class act, and ironically probably the dish – more even so than biryani – people most associate with Clay’s. One of my oldest friends would probably nominate this as his death row dish. His teenage son loves it as much as he does. I like the idea that they’ve bonded through Clay’s beautiful food.

Being lucky enough to know Nandana a little bit, the irony is that I imagine she could have mixed feelings about this dish topping the list. Because as a constant innovator, she is always on to the next thing, the next dish, the next combination of flavours. The idea that the first dish she ever served is the one she is remembered for might frustrate her, like a band with a new album out that is expected to play the hits.

I do have sympathy with that, but sometimes you need to know when you’ve created a classic. The world doesn’t have another song like Yesterday. Reading doesn’t have another dish quite like this venison bhuna.

• Click here for dishes 50-41
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• Click here for dishes 30-21
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This piece is part of Edible Reading at 10. See also:

• The 10 most significant restaurants of the last decade
• The 10 saddest closures of the last decade
• Edible Reading and me

20. Vegetable samosa, Cake & Cream

The decisions get really difficult from this point on. But picking the vegetable samosas from Cake & Cream, a little bakery just off the Wokingham Road, has never been a difficult decision. Their assorted pakora, sold by weight, are marvellous but the samosas, for me, are next level. They’re old school triangles rather than Punjabi pyramids, but they’re outstanding and, as far as I can tell, made and cooked to order. 

You wait there in that bare front room, watching people come and go collecting their preorders and their cakes, knowing that soon it will be your turn and you’ll get a plastic bag full of piping hot samosas to carry off home. They’ll give you one or two little plastic tubs of hot sauce, although the masala filling is flecked with chilli and has plenty of heat of its own. Apart from that it’s just the magical three Ps, potatoes, peas and pastry. They have a minimum order for card purchases, but if you stock up and throw some pakora in it’s easy to get over the threshold. I buy some to treat myself after a trip to my dentist, just up the road, and I get envious looks on the number 17 home.

19. Fried chicken, ThaiGrr!

I love fried chicken in all its forms, which is by now a matter of public record. But in a town with plenty of options ThaiGrr’s fried chicken really does stand out. It’s jointed chicken on the bone, you get plenty of it in a portion and the brittle crispiness of the skin, itself scattered with fried garlic, is one of those mouthfuls that makes the world seem, if just for a minute, like a blessed and blissful place. I first discovered it as a delivery and I thought it was pretty good, but you have to have it in the restaurant where it’s out of the fryer, on to the plate and in front of you in no time. I’ve only ever been to ThaiGrr! without ordering it once. I regretted it almost immediately.

18. Beetroot and peanut croquette, The Lyndhurst

This used to be on the Lyndhurst’s specials menu and then it got promoted, so now it’s a regular fixture and, for me, it’s the pick of their current starters. You get two huge, pillowy croquettes, breadcrumbs fried to a crisp, with a really clever mixture of deep, earthy beetroot and peanut along with a soupçon of heat. Throw in a trio of accompaniments – a bright herb chutney, a carrot chutney and a deep sauce with tamarind like high octane HP – and you have a gorgeous plate of food which I’ve ordered an awful lot over the past few months. And, because the Lyndhurst never wastes their time or yours, even the salad is perfectly sized, perfectly dressed and eminently worth eating.

17. Pork belly, Clay’s Kitchen

Who had number 17 in the sweepstake as the first time Clay’s made an appearance in this list? If that’s you, pat yourself on the back. Their pork belly was a new addition to the menu when Clay’s opened at London Street, post-Covid, and it’s been a mainstay ever since. It’s sumptuous stuff – few restaurants can cook pork belly half as well as Clay’s do – and the flavour of it is truly off the scale. I’ve always adored any dish with jaggery in it, and here it gives a sticky-sweetness that marries beautifully with belly pork.

Underneath it all, there’s the hum of ginger, knocking the edge off and lending the heat that makes it a three-dimensional, fully realised dish. One day I’ll have a plate of this to myself, but short of going to dinner with a vegetarian I’m not sure how that will ever happen. My serving suggestion is to have it with a dry white wine to cut through all that indulgence. Actually, I’m just saying that to sound like I know what I’m talking about: my real serving suggestion is to order two portions.

16. Challoumi wrap, Purée

Forget “Sam’s Wraps”, if you’re in the centre of Reading at lunchtime this is the wrap you want, from Sam Adaci’s big green food truck just outside the Boots on Broad Street. Everything he does is good – including his magnificent falafel made and fried to order – but my heart belongs to his Challoumi wrap. Loads and loads of superbly spiced chicken, cooked and finished on the hot plate, just enough heat and charred edges, is laden into a sizeable flatbread with salad, pickles, garlic sauce, chilli sauce and halloumi.

It’s hard to eat tidily – it’s more a tube than a wrap in fairness, without a closed end – but you’ll find yourself scavenging for every last mouthful. I sincerely hope he raises his prices shortly after receiving this accolade (I think he reads the blog: Sam, sort it out) but as this went to press you can get one of these for six pounds fifty. If you’ve never tried one and this even remotely sounds like your kind of thing – and unless you’re vegetarian or vegan I’m not sure how it couldn’t be – you owe it to yourself to make a pilgrimage to Broad Street to check it out. Tell him I sent you: he’s the unfailingly cheerful chap up at the hot plate, working like an absolute Trojan.

15. Chicken chilli, Kamal’s Kitchen

I first encountered Kamal’s chicken chilli when I ate at Namaste Kitchen, and it was the beginning of a long love affair. It was hot – properly hot, not just what my friend James calls “white people hot” – with an almost-fruity acrid sauce like nothing else I’d had: Kamal later told me that the secret ingredient was Heinz tomato ketchup.

I missed it for a long time, but when Kamal opened his eponymous restaurant on Caversham Road I was delighted to find that, if anything, he’d managed to improve it further over the intervening years. It really is an intoxicating, addictive dish and it still has enough bite, in more ways than one, to hold your attention and simply refuse to let go. When I held a readers’ lunch at Kamal’s Kitchen, last summer, it was the star of the show. Afterwards we went to Phantom for post lunch beers and I lost count of the number of people who said “fuck me, that chicken chilli”, or words to that effect.

14. Mini raj kachori, Clay’s Kitchen

One thing I really love about Clay’s is its determination to make the best version of any dish they decide to cook. You see it across their menu, and it makes me a tedious restaurant reviewer when I visit other Indian restaurants in town. You could probably make a very good drinking game from ER reviews, and I wouldn’t be surprised if somebody already has. Lengthy preamble that has nothing to do with the restaurant: two fingers. Breaks the 2000 word mark again: two fingers. Moan about Reading Borough Council, à propos of nothing: two fingers. Say “it’s okay, but Clay’s does it better”: down your drink in one.

So yes, this dish, the mini raj kachori from Clay’s small plates menu, is phenomenal. And yes, it’s a superior reimagining of the kind of dishes you can get at Bhel Puri House, or Shree Krishna Vada Pav. It’s a crisp pastry shell, like a hollow bubbled crisp, crammed with a spicy mixture of potato and pulses, cool with mint, vibrant with heat, drizzled with tamarind and yoghurt and sev. But where Bhel Puri House’s, or SKVP’s equivalent are prosaic but fun, this is a symphonic, epic dish without a gastronomic hair out of place. Everything on Clay’s small plates menu is miraculous in its own way, but this one’s my favourite.

13. Sweet and sour aubergine, Kungfu Kitchen

Who had number 13 in the sweepstake as the first time Kungfu Kitchen made an appearance in this list? Nothing like a running joke, right? But I imagine many ardent fans of KFK will be outraged that this dish doesn’t rank even higher. It is an absolute cracker, a dish which completely transcends its description. I’ve not yet met anybody who dislikes aubergine that has tried this dish and not made an exception for it.

Ditto for people who aren’t fond of sweet and sour, because KFK’s dish is genuinely sweet and sour rather than most sweet and sour dishes, which are actually sweet and even sweeter. So this is more complex and nuanced than that – it is absolutely beautiful and I think pretty much everybody who has ever tried it at KFK has it on their shortlist of must-order items.

I have photos of the vast majority of the dishes in my top 50, but this one eludes me. That’s because when it’s plonked down on the table I never, ever have time to get my phone out before someone at my table has grabbed a spoon and started dishing it up. Who can blame them?

12. Cut mirchi chat, Clay’s Kitchen

We’re now at the point in the list where I could write great gushing love letters to every single dish, and I’m trying to rein myself in. But really, this dish is one of my favourite things you can eat in Reading and even sitting down to write about it makes me realise it’s far too long since I ate it last – not since the 9th of June, the day of that rave review in the Guardian, in fact. It’s hard to describe, harder still to do justice to. It’s a chilli, wrapped in a glorious crunchy coating (including, at a guess, gram flour), fried and cut into slices. 

Nowadays it comes to the table all fancy, covered in finely diced tomato, pomegranate seeds and crispy sev, but I remember this dish when it made its debut at London Street when it was less glamorous but no less delicious. It never needed the makeover, although it looks beautiful now, because it was a knockout from day one. Like many of Clay’s starters and small plates, it’s absolutely perfect for sharing which just reinforces the kind of place Clay’s is, where meals are all about shared experiences. I just love that. The menu describes it as “a childhood favourite snack”: and to think I had to make do with Nice N’ Spicy Nik Naks.

11. Lamb with cumin, Kungfu Kitchen

I had this dish on my second ever visit to Kungfu Kitchen, and I could have told you then that it would be one of Reading’s 50 best dishes four years later, barring any disasters like Kungfu Kitchen burning to the ground. I found it very difficult to imagine I’d ever live in a town where there were fifty dishes better than this, and if I did I imagine Kungfu Kitchen would still be behind more than one or two of them.

It’s deceptively simple – ribbons of almost-pink lamb, fried as little as they can get away with, with onions, chillies, coriander and sesame seeds. But the devil is in the detail, in that sauce, reduced and clinging to every crinkle of the meat, rich with cumin, deep, delicious and unlike anything else.

Well: I say that, but I remember trying a similar dish, a couple of years previously, at Memory Of Sichuan. Memory Of Sichuan is not a bad restaurant at all, but comparing their dish to KFK’s is like comparing a Rolf Harris painting to a Turner. One last thing – this is a dish to attack on arrival, to wolf down. You want that lamb almost still bleating, before it continues to cook through and those fibres toughen. Think of it as a licence for gluttony.

• Click here for dishes 50-41
• Click here for dishes 40-31
• Click here for dishes 30-21
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This piece is part of Edible Reading at 10. See also:

• The 10 most significant restaurants of the last decade
• The 10 saddest closures of the last decade
• Edible Reading and me

40. Crispy squid, Intoku

Fried squid – or calamari, the two seem to be used interchangeably on Reading menus – is ten a penny in Reading, but you’ll struggle to find a better rendition than Intoku’s. Served very simply, beautifully coated and stunningly tender, it’s almost worth making a detour to Intoku just for this dish. But be warned – if you do, and they’re on form, all the squid you order elsewhere in town will feel just a little more bouncy, a little less impressive. Is it worth it? Take it from me, it is.

39. Fried lamb momo, Momo 2 Go

I’ve had my fair share of takeaways from cheery little Momo 2 Go, partway down the Oxford Road. But some dishes don’t travel, and you need to eat them there and then. Nothing exemplifies that better than Momo 2 Go’s fried lamb momo, crunchy little balloons filled with marvellous minced lamb. Order, dip, devour, leave delighted. Nothing could be simpler: they might be called Momo 2 Go, but these will make you stay.

38. Spider roll, Iro Sushi

A recent, joyous discovery, Iro’s spider roll is probably my favourite sushi in the whole of Reading. It’s a medley of showstoppers – crunchy soft shell crab bolstered with matchsticks of cucumber, bound up in their peerless rice, slices of buttery avocado draped indolently over the top. But that’s not all, because the whole thing is drizzled with spicy mayo and then festooned with tobiko, which pops against the molars. Everything is great, everything is great together and everything works. Writing this has made me want to order it now, although I suppose that’s the equivalent of laughing at your own jokes.

37. Pulled pork roll, The Nag’s Head

The Nag’s Head is one of Reading’s finest places to drink beer, if not the finest. But pork scratchings and Mini Cheddars can only accompany beer up to a point, so it’s very fortunate that the pub has also turned its thoughts to the kind of snacks that can fuel a drinking session without being too fiddly or forcing you to go elsewhere to eat. The crown jewel of their menu, for me, is the pulled pork roll – strand after strand of yielding pork, dressed with a slightly punchy barbecue sauce in a very serviceable brioche bun. The garnish of ready salted crinkle cut crisps instead of some token undressed salad? Icing on the cake.

36. Monkey Burger, Monkey Lounge

I was worried I’d need to take Monkey Lounge off this list, because it closed for its summer break and then its summer break went on for weeks longer than initially promised. I feared we had another “temporarily closed” to “permanently closed” debacle on our hands. But gladly those fears were unfounded and it reopened on Friday. They make their own burgers and they are an absolute delight – thick, coarse patties with bacon, cheese, burger sauce and crisp iceberg. No frills, no mucking about, just a burger where everything is spot on and you can eat it without unhooking your jaw.

When I first visited Monkey Lounge I did with no particular expectations, but it gladdened my jaded heart that the burger was so much better than it needed to be. This is the entry level burger, by the way: they do a Monkey “King” Burger where you can double up on the patty but although I’m greedy, I’ve never been that greedy. The chips, considering they’re bought in, are decent too.

35. Sausage panuozzo, Madoo

Madoo does many great toasted sandwiches. But most of them are made with their flat, sturdy focaccia, which I’d say is more of an acquired taste and not necessarily the airy, cakelike stuff you’re used to. For me, their panuozzo is where everything comes together. More like a panino or a ciabatta the bread has more give, and makes for an infinitely more satisfying sandwich.

But that’s just the half of it, because what elevates Madoo’s panuozzo and gives it a place on this list is the filling – a superb amalgam of glossy molten scamorza, dense clusters of fennel sausage meat and the piece de resistance, cubes of potato. Madoo, like Shree Krishna Vada Pav, understand the appeal of sticking potato in a sandwich, and a note of smoke permeates the whole thing, courtesy of the scamorza. I could eat this every week. Some months I do.

34. Tiramisu, Sarv’s Slice

One of only a handful of sweet treats in my top 50, Sarv’s Slice morphs into Sarv’s Slab for this magnificent wodge of boozy, creamy indulgence. Don’t get me wrong, I really like Sarv’s pizzas, and if their carbonara special was a permanent fixture it would have waltzed into this list. But I have a real weakness for tiramisu and Sarv’s version is about as good as it gets. You have to eat it with a wooden spoon, but that’s the only way this dish and the words “wooden spoon” will ever be mentioned in the same sentence. 

33. ‘Nduja pinsa, Mama’s Way

This is the last in a trio of consecutive Italian masterpieces, and would you believe this is the the second and final pizza in my list? Hard to credit, I know, but Mama’s Way makes the grade because their pinsa is something a little different from the Neapolitan, bubbled on the outside, saggy on the inside template that has been adopted across the country. Their pinsa is simultaneously airier and a tad more robust, and I’m rather fond of it.

Purists would sniff at this and point to the fact that Mama’s Way buys its bases in. I say purists are missing out because Mama’s Way buys other stuff in too, really good stuff, that transforms the humble pinsa into a thing of beauty. Splodge after splodge of brick red ‘nduja, detonations of umami delight scattered across the pizza, make it a perfect solo treat, sitting up at that window with a glass of white wine or a negroni, watching people heading up and down Duke Street. Reading is never going to be Bologna, but on a good day it can make you miss Bologna a lot less.

32. Chilli paneer, Bhel Puri House

I always expected this dish to make my top 50 but just to be on the safe side I made a beeline for Bhel Puri House recently, for the first time in a long time, to make sure it wasn’t just the nostalgia talking. I’m so happy it wasn’t – if anything absence has made the heart grow fonder and the palate more grateful. Bhel Puri House’s chilli paneer is an old school classic, and it’s stood the test of time superbly.

Bhel Puri was here before the likes of Clay’s, Madras Flavours and Shree Krishna Vada Pav (theirs was the first vada pav I ever tasted) and they are still going strong without making a song and dance about it. Their paneer Manchurian is good, but their chilli paneer is the benchmark – savoury, spicy, sticky and tumbled with peppers, spring onions and just enough potent green chilli to make your eyes water. I love the fact that a dish I first ate in the first six months of my blog is still right up there.

31. Pork gyros wrap, Tasty Greek Souvlaki

You could say that this is the third pork sarnie in this section of my top 50, and I suppose technically you’d be right. But Tasty Greek Souvlaki’s pork gyros wrap is so much more than that. I’ve always found it strange that they’re named after souvlaki when, for me, their gyros is so superb. And this, as a sandwich, absolutely has it all: ribbons of gyros meat, shaved off and fried until crispy, smothered in a decent tzatziki and bundled into a wrap with a sheaf of top-notch chips. 

They used to be an absolutely ridiculous bargain but even now, in 2023 with inflation through the roof, one will still only set you back something like seven pounds fifty. With a street food market on its doorstep twice a week, Tasty Greek Souvlaki has to offer something special at lunchtime to stay in the game. Unlike their sadly departed neighbours Mum Mum, who didn’t even last a year selling banh mi, Tasty Greek understood that only a truly spectacular sandwich would do.

• Click here for dishes 50-41
• Click here for dishes 30-21
• Click here for dishes 20-11
• Click here for dishes 10-1

This piece is part of Edible Reading at 10. See also:

• The 10 most significant restaurants of the last decade
• The 10 saddest closures of the last decade
• Edible Reading and me

I decided at the start of the year that it would be a fun idea to close off my tenth birthday celebrations by counting down Reading’s 50 best dishes. I may have a moan about them from time to time, but like everyone else I love a list. I love getting to December, firing up Pitchfork, looking at its top 50 albums of the year and, naturally, never having heard of most of them. Half the enjoyment of lists like these is feeling your tastes have been validated when they align with those of the person compiling the list, the other half is thinking that they’re numbskulls when they don’t. Well, maybe it’s more 30-70, but you get my meaning.

Well, it was a fun idea – in theory. In practice putting it together has been far more difficult than I imagined and has involved ranking, re-ranking, shuffling the pack when restaurants have closed since I made my long list and then remembering dishes, or whole restaurants, that I had completely forgotten. One recent discovery forced me to kick a very enjoyable dish out of my list just to make room. 

And of course the mind plays tricks, so in a month where I haven’t written reviews I have been out and about trying and re-trying dishes on my long list to check if they were as good as I remembered. Many were, a couple have come off the list. In at least one case I went to check out a dish, found it had lost its lustre but found, on the same menu, a game-changing replacement.

I should lay down a couple of ground rules for this list. First of all, I decided it should be dishes you can only – or mostly – get in Reading. That has ruled out chains, in most cases, although I’ve been more understanding where a restaurant has a very small number of branches. I can’t pretend there’s rigid logic to that but it does, for instance, mean that you don’t have anything on here from Honest or Pho. In one or two cases, I may have relaxed that ever so slightly. Normally I would say “sorry, I don’t make the rules up” but, well, in this case I have. If you don’t like them, you’ll just have to read another of the many lists of Reading’s 50 best dishes wafting around online.

Second of all, it has to be a dish you can get in Reading right now. There are few things more annoying, in my book, than pieces that ignore this rule. Whether it’s reviews of plays you can’t go to or products you can’t buy, they always have that smug whiff of “here’s what you missed out on”. So if a dish isn’t available right now it missed the cut. This has especially, I’m afraid, penalised restaurants that change their menu frequently and that, in particular, has counted against one of my favourite places, the Lyndhurst. So their karaage chicken, their gorgeous curried monkfish, their Korean wings are all incredible but as they’re not on the menu right now they fall into the category of what might have been.

Now we’re done with the caveats, here are the disclaimers. I make no pretence to have tried every dish in Reading, and that means that this list is my best, most informed selection but of course, it can’t claim to be definitive. There are probably gems on every menu that I haven’t yet discovered, and there are certainly great restaurants across Reading not represented here. In some cases that’s because I haven’t got to them yet, and in others it’s because sadly I haven’t made it back to them in time – Vegivores, in particular, springs to mind.

I’ve never really had any time for imposter syndrome. Writers can be an egotistical bunch, and in my experience the more a writer claims to be paralysed by imposter syndrome the more likely it is that they’re more taken with the sound of their prose voice than you could ever be. I’ve been doing this for ten years, and I’m quite happy that I’ve earned my place doing so. But even I have to admit that putting this list together introduced an uncharacteristic level of doubt. What right did I have to pronounce on this? I might, after a decade of reviewing Reading restaurants, be as well qualified as anyone, but was I any better qualified than anybody?

Two things reassured me. One was a comment I got on Twitter from my recent dining companion Emma. “You’ve eaten way more than 50 dishes in Reading over the last 10 years” she said, and put that way she has a fair point. But the other was a lovely comment I received on my blog’s Facebook page when I announced that I was going to publish this list. It was from regular reader John, and with his permission I’ve reproduced it here in its entirety. “I’m trying to think about ones which might not feature on your list” he said, and then he wrote this:

Kungfu Kitchen’s salt and pepper snow white mushrooms, and their stir fried five spiced firm tofu with chilli should make the cut. Clay’s baghare baigan (which I think you can now only order from home, tragically). Papa Gee’s melanzana pizza, and their salsiccia e friarelli pizza, eaten rolled up and slowly. Coconut’s pork satay. Honest Burger’s local Reading market burger. 

House of Flavours’ incomparable lamb chops, and their pistachio chicken curry. Memory of Sichuan’s cauliflower in hot spicy pot (and their leftover egg fried rice, eaten with a serving of Ottolenghi’s chicken Marbella). Kobeda Palace’s aubergine curry, and their okra curry, and their hummus eaten with one of those naan breads which could clothe a six year-old. 

Osaka’s grilled cheese gyoza because they’re so wrong they’re actually right (but still wrong, even so), and their kimchi seafood tofu stew, which should only ever be eaten on the coldest day of the year. One of Workhouse’s sausage rolls, eaten in the Forbury in the sunshine, and one of CUP’s bougatsas, eaten outside in the shade of that massive linden tree, where every crisp crack of pastry coats the table downwind in a dusting of cinnamon and icing sugar. A piece of Picnic’s plum and marzipan cake, for self-explanatory reasons.

And a murgh makhani from Miah’s Garden of Gulab, for old times’ sake – and to remind us what the best Indian dish in Reading was twelve years ago, and how far we’ve come since.

John’s list is notable for two reasons. One is that it’s just a beautiful roll call of excellent food, and I challenge you to read it without wanting to check out at least one thing on it. But it’s also notable because, without exception, absolutely nothing on John’s list matches with the fifty dishes I’ll be talking about in the next five days. And that, really, is kind of the point. To paraphrase the great Spencer Tracy in one of my favourite films of all time, Inherit The Wind: my list is a just a list. It’s a good list, but it is not the only list. 

So I hope you enjoy reading it. I hope you enjoy it when, like a game of Battleships, my selection happens to be the same as yours and I hope you enjoy calling me every name under the sun because your own favourites are missing. But most of all, I hope it makes you check out something I’ve chosen, or simply go back to your favourite place and order your favourite. Or even make your own list, every bit as good and valid as mine, as John has done. I can’t think of a better way of ending a month celebrating ten years of my blog than by reflecting that I could have compiled this list four times over, each time completely different, and still not exhausted what Reading has to offer.

50. Dosa chips, Madras Flavours

Many fine meals start with a snack, and my list does too. When I visited Madras Flavours earlier in the year I found a lot to like. but this dish – the result of someone having the ingenious idea of frying little curls of dosa and liberally dusting them with a potent spice powder – was the thing that has stayed with me.

49. Mutton chops, Adda Hut

From chips to chops, although chop is misleading in this context. Because what Woodley’s Adda Hut describes as mutton chops are in fact hulking great spheres of breaded minced mutton – somewhere between a croquette and an eggless Scotch egg, with a note of spice almost reminiscent of haggis. Woodley features in my top 50 twice – the other entry might be less of a surprise, but I was thoroughly charmed by the quiet loveliness of this dish.

48. Gaeng massaman, Thai Table

Thai Table, just the other side of Caversham Bridge, is one of those under-the-radar places that just unceremoniously gets on with doing its stuff without any social media or, seemingly, any comms at all. Their massaman beef curry, all gloriously tender beef in an intensely soothing sauce with a little heat and a warm coconut hug, is a positive balm for the soul from one of Reading’s most modest restaurants.

47. Banana bun, Filter Coffee House

I’m bending my own rules a little here, as Filter Coffee House, on Castle Street just before the alms houses, is a Reading newcomer, having only been open three weeks or so. But their banana bun is a little miracle and richly deserves a place on this list. It’s quite hard to describe, being almost glazed on the outside and beautifully dense yet spongy inside. The banana comes through loud and clear but what makes it, and makes it complex and interesting, is the rich speckling of cumin seeds inside. I had mine sitting up at the window, watching the to and fro of Castle Street, and mentally I was already planning when I would return.

46. Smashed avo, The Switch

The Switch, out on Tilehurst Triangle, is the sort of accomplished brunch spot anywhere in Reading would be happy to have on its doorstep. And its smashed avo on toast is in danger of giving that dish – the bane of moronic, anti-wokerati Daily Mail articles the world over – a very good name. Skilfully executed, laced with lime and given an extra dimension with chimichurri and Parmesan crisps, it’s one of Reading’s best and most grown-up brunches. I had mine with bacon on top, but that isn’t compulsory.

45. Pizza Sofia Loren, Papa Gee

Arguably Papa Gee’s most famous pizza, the Sofia Loren has been putting a smile on the faces of Reading residents for over a decade. A simple but effective affair, with pepperoni, red onion and nuggets of fennel-rich, crumbly Italian sausage, it has been around since all the new pretenders to Reading’s pizza throne arrived in town. And you wouldn’t bet against it still being around when they’ve all given up, either (perhaps I see it as a kindred spirit, come to think of it).

Zoë likes to pimp hers with blue cheese to create what she describes as the “Sofia Loren +”. I can imagine Gaetano rolling his eyes as he prepares that, in the kitchen, but then Zoë thinks everything tastes better with blue cheese.

44. French toast with bacon and maple syrup, The Collective

For a dish like this to make my list, it has to be its absolute best self, with every ingredient at the top of its game. The Collective understands that particular assignment, and what comes out of their kitchen is this dish as good as it possibly gets – phenomenal, rich, spongy French toast made with brioche, bang-on crispy streaky bacon (from the nearby Caversham Butcher, last time I checked), the whole thing bathed in maple syrup, with a generous hand in charge of pouring. With so few components and ingredients there’s no hiding place if it isn’t perfect. But The Collective doesn’t need to worry about that.

43. Tuna Turner, Shed

We finish this section of the list with a trio of sandwiches, all three illustrating some of Reading’s best lunch venues. First up, we have the godfather of Reading sandwiches, and one that probably justifies popping up a blue plaque on the outside of Merchants Place.

The Tuna Turner has acquired an iconic status most Reading dishes can only dream of. Sure, it’s a tuna melt, but there’s something about it and its genius combination of red onion, sundried tomato and jalapeños that has captivated Reading’s lunch crowd for a very long time, with good reason. Its predecessor had capers in it, which I thought I would miss, but this is even better.

42. The O’Muffin, Fidget & Bob

Speaking of missing things, I miss the days when Fidget & Bob did a full English with outrageously good scrambled eggs. But that was a lot of work, and their menu now has a streamlined set of breakfast dishes. Happily for us, they took the star of their breakfast – square slabs of sausagemeat not unlike a Lorne sausage – and repurposed it in the O’Muffin, their brilliant attempt to beat McDonalds at their own game. Add hash browns for extra decadence, and if you are going to eat one do it proudly and without apology or shame. It’s the most inportant meal of the day, you know.

41. The Blue, The Grumpy Goat

The Grumpy Goat added another contender to Reading’s pantheon of sandwiches when it started serving food from its new site on Smelly Alley. They have access to good bread, and the cheese is a given, so you’d expect it to be good but even so, it really is a huge treat. There’s something to be said for all their toasties but for me the Blue has the edge. It’s cleverly balanced between salty Colston Bassett Stilton, crunchy batons of apple, walnuts and just a smidge of honey. Sweet and salt in perfect gooey, oozing harmony: lunchtime accompanying beer entirely optional.

• Click here for dishes 40-31
• Click here for dishes 30-21
• Click here for dishes 20-11
• Click here for dishes 10-1

This piece is part of Edible Reading at 10. See also:

• The 10 most significant restaurants of the last decade
• The 10 saddest closures of the last decade
• Edible Reading and me