Falkirk's Sanam voted best restaurant at 2016 Scottish Curry Awards

Sanam Tandoori in Callendar Road, which is celebrating its 40th year in the town, has even more reason to party after scooping the hottest award on the curry Scottish calendar.

Owners Waseem (39), Nadeem (40), Naeem (37) and Azeem Anwar (35) – all brothers – attended the glamorous awards bash at Glasgow’s Marriott Hotel on Monday night, hosted by event organisers Oceanic Consulting.

After winning the best restaurant in the Central area, the brothers joined all the other regional winners on stage for the night’s biggest announcement and couldn’t believe it when the Sanam’s name was called out.

Waseem said: “I looked at my brother and asked, ‘Did I hear that right, is that us?’. My father Mohammed, who is in Pakistan at the moment with my mum, started the business 40 years ago so we’ve been part of Falkirk community for all that time.

“This is our home and I think it’s a great thing for Falkirk. We’ve set a bar and we need to keep our standards high. The judges told me it was our personal touch that made us stand out and we are really proud of that.”

Waseem added: “One of the things the judges really liked was when they were in the restaurant and made a complaint to see how we would react, we dealt with it on the spot.

“While other places have managers, we make decisions there and then. If someone complains we make sure it doesn’t put them off coming back and can give vouchers or something. Things like this really make a difference.”

The Sanam wasn’t the only Falkirk winner either as the Tasty Grill in Ladysmill won the Takeaway of the Year for Central Scotland.

See page 19 of this week’s paper to see the list of curry houses which have made it onto our shortlist for Curry House of the Year for 2016.