Nul points for Sonargaon

Brick Lane is such a disappointment. As you walk its length, there's a real buzz - one of the touts claims that there are 55 restaurants to choose from - but, sadly, the most interesting place is the supermarket. There you can find a host of unfamiliar vegetables, hair oils with exotic labels, and a freezer full of those enormous carp-like Bengali fish.

The restaurant touts are a pain, they push and push: 'Twenty per cent discount', 'first round free', 'best food'. Pestering people until they are irritated is not the most sensible way of attracting punters.

The Sonargaon will be celebrating its first birthday this spring. Although the formal address is Osborn Street, it fronts on to Brick Lane and the complimentary choccies that arrive with the bill claim that it is the 'largest restaurant in the East End'.

There is a huge room downstairs and a large dining room at ground level. The design is the modern curry house equivalent of flock wallpaper: there are brightly coloured pictures on the wall and a sort of frieze that pairs green and pink stripes. There's even a light sculpture that twinkles away merrily with coloured LEDs hanging from the ceiling.

The food is not cheap. From the starters, the Sonargaon special turns out to be a prawn - a large prawn but not huge, certainly not the kind of prawn you would happily pay £4.95 for. Worse, it comes covered with a thick slick of sauce (presumably that's what makes it 'special').

The sauce is sharp, tomatoey, glutinous and with a gratuitous kick of raw spice and chilli - not a pleasant experience. Chicken tikka comes to the table cold and with a sticky marinade. Malai chops are also cold, but they are tiny, wizened and gnarled into the bargain. But, hallelujah!, at least the sabzi nan is large, hot and well made.

The main courses do not redeem this meal. Sonargaon gosht - a 'signature' dish - is an oily curry, heavy on the tomato with a fierce chilli heat and a few chunks of chewy lamb, plus a price tag of £6.95.

Haash hydrabadi is a duck curry. The vaguely brown gravy is undistinguished - this is a dish that has lost its personality. Dal tarka is sound enough but lacking enough garlic to make it work. Sag bhaji is oily and dressed with lumps of red pepper.

The boiled rice is shocking - cheap rice with many broken grains and it comes to the table in clumps. The chapattis are good and hot, though. Somewhere in the depths of this vast restaurant there is a bread chef who is doing his best.

It may be due to the presence of several large parties, but dishes take an interminable time to arrive and, when they do, service is fumbled and harassed.