Etles Uyghur, London: ‘You’ll be well fed, and learn a little along the way’ – restaurant review

‘A community space into which you have been invited’: Etles Uyghur Restaurant, London. Photograph: Sophia Evans/The Observer

Etles Uyghur Restaurant, 424 Finchley Road, London NW2 2HY (020 7431 5698). Starters £7.50-£9.99, mains £12.50-£16, big plate chicken £30, desserts £4.50. Unlicensed

The menu at Etles Uyghur restaurant, located at the leafier Golders Green end of London’s Finchley Road, is not just a thrilling list of edible promises. It’s also a subtle lesson in physical and human geography. Obviously, there’s no pork listed because of the predominantly Muslim culture of the Uyghur people, which the Chinese government has been attempting to annihilate so brutally, for so long. Nor is there much in the way of fish because Xinjiang province, home to the Uyghurs, is far from the sea. Here it’s all about beef, lamb and chicken.