Swadish by Ajay Kumar
Ajay Kumar won the Scotland heat of Great British Menu 2024 with a canapé of langoustine roasted on idli and cooked for the finals as Scotland's representative, five years after opening Swadish in a former Victorian fire station on Ingram Street.
Why go
Kumar swapped a computing degree for the Chopra School of Cooking, worked kitchens in India, Malaysia and Singapore, and moved to Scotland in 2009 (Great British Chefs). Swadish, opened 2019, is his argument that Indian cuisine is far more than curry. It is smoke, fire, texture, aroma, fermentation, preservation, spice layering, and storytelling
(venue), applied to Scottish game and seafood. The room holds two AA Rosettes, Best in Scotland at the 2022 British Curry Awards and Outstanding Indian Restaurant of the Year at the 2023 Scottish Curry Awards.
Order this / avoid
- Order: whatever carries his GBM DNA: the langoustine-on-idli pairing that won the judges unanimously, the chaat work that made his name on the show, and the spiced Scottish lamb; his competition lamb ran eighteen spices and drew a flat
Fantastic
from Tom Kerridge2. - Avoid: hunting for Grilled, his casual second site; it closed permanently in 2026 and gift vouchers transferred to Swadish (The Caterer).
What locals & experts say
- Great British Menu (BBC, 2024): Scotland heat winner and national finalist; Kerridge on the dessert course:
Flavour-wise for me, this has been the highlight.
2 - AA: two Rosettes for culinary excellence, held into 2026.6
- British Curry Awards (2022): Best in Scotland; Scottish Curry Awards 2023: Outstanding Indian Restaurant of the Year.3
- Kumar, on the GBM final:
the biggest achievement of my career to date.
1
Good to know
- Timing: Wednesday and Thursday 1pm to 10pm, Friday and Saturday noon to 11pm, Sunday 1pm to 10pm; closed Monday and Tuesday.
- Booking: recommended, via swadish.co.uk or 0141 553 0581.
- Where: 33 Ingram Street, Merchant City, the old Central Fire Engine Station; trust this address over the Maps pin, whose geocode for this restaurant is broken.
Jeff's take (his words)
- Note: "Indian fine dining, famous UK chef recently in the finals of the Great British Menu TV series."
- On where it ranks, 2 August 2026: "even celentanos >> swadish he's a great chef, but the cooking and restaurant is better in the other locations." He keeps the chef and the room apart, and so does this entry. Read one way he means the better rooms in the city, read another he means Kumar's own other sites, and his casual grill on West Regent Street shut in mid-2026. Both readings land in the same place for this address.
- What did not change: on 30 July 2026 he put this room on the destination list, and it stays there.
Verdict
should-visit — Worth the detour, and still on the destination list. Ajay Kumar is the real thing: Punjab-born, Chopra School trained, kitchens in India, Malaysia and Singapore behind him, and in 2024 he won the Scotland heat of Great British Menu with a langoustine roasted on idli and cooked in the national final. Glasgow runs a deep curry field, eight Indian rooms on this list and the birthplace claim on chicken tikka masala, and pushing that heritage into a fine-dining register on Scottish game and seafood is a lane of one here. The AA holds it at two Rosettes into 2026 and its inspector reads the cooking as 'familiar dishes lifted with flair and precision', with 'obvious spicing but the main ingredients always shine'. That case lands at should-visit rather than must-visit. Two things hold the rung. First, nobody has published a review of this dining room. Checked again on 2026-08-01 across the Infatuation, Harden's and the Good Food Guide: nothing bylined exists, no chef has voted for it in the city's industry guide, and Tom Kerridge's 'fantastic' was aimed at a competition plate in a television kitchen rather than at a plate on Ingram Street. RUBRIC_JEFFSCORE wants a 9-10 on culinary plus a can't-get-it-elsewhere reason for the top rung, and the uniqueness is here while the culinary evidence is an inspectorate line and two trade awards from 2022 and 2023. Second, Jeff (first-hand, 2026-08-02) has now ranked it: 'even celentanos >> swadish he's a great chef, but the cooking and restaurant is better in the other locations.' He separates the chef from the room, and so does this entry. His earlier ruling of 2026-07-30, that this belongs on the destination list and that Lychee Oriental did not outrank it, is not retracted and is not overridden: a Hearth at should-visit stays in the Destination band by design. What changes is that the room no longer sorts as one of the first sends in the city. Go for the technique and the ambition. Go to Celentano's first.