Glaswegians will soon be taken on a nostalgia trip, with the return of a famous Finnieston food spot.
As we reported last week, work is well underway to bring Murphy's Pakora Bar back to Glasgow, an iconic eatery that was regularly home to beer-soaked revellers on a Saturday night.
And Glasgow Live can reveal that more than two decades after closing its doors, seemingly for the very last time, Murphy's will once again welcome in diners and drinkers at the beginning of April.
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What's more, the pakora bar's comeback comes courtesy of the same family who last served up sensational late night snacks, back in 1999.
Then, Murphy's was run by Sanjay and Jiggy Majhu, well renowned and much loved Glasgow restaurateurs behind many of our city's favourite Indian restaurants, under The Ashoka Group.
Now, their son Nitesh will be taking the reigns on Argyle Street, satisfying a long-held ambition to run his own place.
25-year-old Nitesh, who will be cooking in the kitchen and front of house at the new Murphy's, told Glasgow Live: "My mum and dad bought the business in 1996 and ran it through to 1999. I just want to bring it back to life with a modern twist on it.
"My dad was really gutted when he had to sell it. When he did he was in the final year of his pharmacy degree and I think he needed to fund life at that point and then The Goat took over it.
"I'm in the final year of my law degree and I've always been really passionate about food. I'm up to date with everything in Glasgow and I'm always out eating.
"I've always been a wee Instagram chef, but nothing more than that. Then, this opportunity came up."
The original Murphy's Pakora Bar was located at 1287-1289 Argyle Street on the Finnieston strip. Now, it will pop up just a couple of doors down at number 1293 at the former Spice Of Life, a move which provides a further family link with the past - Nitesh worked his first ever shift as a waiter in the restaurant at just seven years old.
Nitesh said: "It's not the original Murphy's Pakora Bar unit, but the one next door. The unit we've got used to be Spice Of Life.
"Spice of Life was my mum and dad's first restaurant. That's where my dad started as a waiter. He was then a manager, then a franchiser. Then he bought The Ashoka Group.
"It's quite fitting that my dad then offered this to me as my first restaurant. I've always wanted to open my first restaurant and in a sense his first restaurant is my first restaurant, just 30 years later.
"It's the perfect place for me, my family know it so well. I grew up there. I had my first ever shift as a waiter there when I was just seven years old! I chucked on a full suit and tie and everything and one of the managers, bless him, had to walk about with me the whole night making sure I wasn't doing anything daft, polishing cutlery and all the rest of it!
"I've worked in various bars and restaurants over the years, I've taken what I can from them and what I can from our own restaurants."
Family and history have been very much intertwined in the move to bring Murphy's back, with even the workmen involved in the space's £250,000 refurb having worked on his parents' restaurants as far back as the 1960s.
Explaining how much work has gone in to making his dream a reality, Nitesh said: "There's a live kitchen, you can see in it. The former office has been taken away, which can be done as a wee private dining area for 16 covers or for people in the summer to sit and have a wee look outside as it's front-facing.
"We've got two of the guys, Gordon and Willie, who have been building the Ashokas since the 1960s. Willie turned 83 last week and he's still building our bars! They've been building the place with us since the first of February.
"We've kept it in the family, but we've also kept all the people that have been involved with the core of The Ashoka Group."
And despite the time that has passed, much of the original feel and atmosphere of Murphy's will remain the same.
When asked what Glaswegians can expect, Nitesh said: "It's a late-night pakora bar. We won't be open until 4pm every day and on the weekends we'll be open until 1am in the morning and we'll be serving food until late as well.
"The idea we have is you can come for dinner and get a full dinner. We're only doing six curries, most of it is pakoras and really nice small plates, really refined small plates. We've got rices, breads, poppadoms and stuff.
"You can either come in and get a pint and pakora, because that will be a deal. You can come in, you can just drink. You can come in, get a few pakoras, before you go to the Hydro or that kind of thing, because no-one wants to be too full before they go - you don't want to be a couple of curries and five pints deep before you go to a big show!
"You can come here, have some small plates and go out, or you can spend the night with us. There's a really nice wine selection, a really good cocktail menu."
In another moment that makes Murphy's comeback feel 'meant to be', Nitesh told us the incredible story of how he found menu inspiration in the unlikeliest of places.
He said: "I came up with the whole food and drinks menu myself, from ideas that I've taken over the years. I've been working with the other chefs at the Ashoka Group, who have been helping my develop my ideas into actual dishes.
"My dad wanted a few of the recipes to be the original recipes we had from the old days. We sat there and went through the onion bhaji recipe again, finally got it right and things like that. I've added my own twist to a few of the recipes, there's quite a wee bit of Scottish influence there. We've got things like lamb bhoona tacos on the menu which is a bit different.
"Being Indian, it's really easy to make things vegetarian and vegan. 60% of the menu is vegan which means it's inclusive for everyone.
"But I was just missing a few pakoras - I needed a bit more.
"When we started doing the refurb, I found, in the floorboards, one of the old Murphy's Pakora Bar menus we'd been trying to locate for ages.
"We're a pakora bar, we've got loads of small plates, but I needed more pakoras and now we've got 18.
"That was from finding that menu."
Murphy's Pakora Bar is aiming to open at the star of April.
Do you remember Murphy's Pakora Bar from yesteryear? Let us know in comments!
