We found the best dosa in Birmingham at a South Indian restaurant in Harborne

Far from Harborne High Street, tucked away in a quiet corner of the affluent neighbourhood, my husband and I found the best dosa in Birmingham.

What is a dosa you may ask. Well, a savoury crepe is the closest I can get to defining it. It can be made with rice and lentils or semolina and lentils, and there are as many varieties as there are countries in the world.

Dosas originate in the south of India - the exact geographical origins are not known - but, you can find them across the length and breadth of India, that’s for sure.

According to historians, dosas could have first been created in either present-day states of Tamil Nadu or Karnataka. Having spent close to five years in Karnataka’s capital Bengaluru - India’s Silicon Valley - I have had a dosa more times than I remember.

One of the most special dosas that one can find in Karnataka is the Mysore Masala Dosa. Mysore, known as the city of palaces, lies in Karnataka and was the capital of the Kingdom of Mysore from 1399 to 1947.

There are several stories about the origin of this dosa and some of them link it to the royal family of Mysore as well. The Mysore Masala Dosa is a rich, ghee-laden, crispy crepe filled with a mashed potato masala.

Located on Northfield Road in Harborne, there is a small restaurant with limited seating and it’s cash-only. And, among all our dining out experiences in the UK in the last two years, Vaibhavam South Indian restaurant turned out to be the best at Mysore Masala Dosa.

We arrived there on Sunday afternoon with no expectations but went home with full bellies and the determination to return to try more of their dishes.

A quick scan of the menu showed that they serve dishes from different south India states like Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and others.

Vaibhavam serves the dosa on a stainless steel plate with compartments keeping in tradition with how South Indian fast-food joints in India serve their food.

The compartments were full with three chutneys: coconut, onion tomato and coconut coriander, and sambar - a lentil-based vegetable stew made with tamarind broth.

If you order Vaibhavam’s Mysore Masala Dosa, you are unlikely to be able to eat anything else with it, so it’s ideal as a sharing dish even if that’s not the traditional way of eating it. Despite being a vegetarian dish, it can easily by around 539 calories or more.

The only other advice I’d give diners is to heed the restaurant’s labels when they say something is spicy. On the menu, the Mysore Masala Dosa is labelled “spicy” but I ignored it and sweated through my meal.