New Bengal

New Bengal sits at the top of Alfreton's King Street, a few doors from where the High Street meets the Chesterfield Road junction, and is one of the longer-running curry houses in this part of Derbyshire. It runs as a proper sit-down restaurant — balti and tandoori specialities cooked on a clay-oven line at the back of the room — and the kitchen also takes deliveries and collections through the evening.

The room is set up for bigger group bookings as well as intimate evenings out, and the operator pitches the room at parties, birthdays and family meals as much as the regular Friday curry. The kitchen runs through to midnight from Sunday to Thursday and on to 1am on Fridays and Saturdays, which is later than most of the surrounding Amber Valley curry houses and gives Alfreton a serious after-pub option. Long-standing local reputation rather than passing fashion is the thing it trades on; locals call it one of the area's best.