Asha's, 12-22 Newhall Street, Birmingham, B3 3LX. Tel: 0121 200 2767

The issue of service in restaurants has become a popular dinner-table talking point thanks to Michel Roux’s BBC2 show.

The revered boss of Le Gavroche is attempting to knock seven young people into shape so they can work front of house without upsetting customers. There were initially eight recruits but one gobby individual got the boot, probably saving him from physical harm inflicted by paying guests.

Service, or rather bad service, can kill a meal; it leaves a bad taste in the mouth, like fetid meat. Serving food isn’t that difficult, which is why we get steamed up when the delivery of plates of food and drinks goes wrong.

I actually masquerade as a waiter almost every day of the week, in my own home, and I bet you do, too.

Typically, I shout at the children – “For the third bloody time, PLEASE come here! Why can’t you HEAR me? We only live in a TERRACE house!” – and ask them to clear their books, CDs, hair bobbles, gloves, belts, socks and bags from the table.

And would you please lay up the table so it looks like a dining space, not a lost property collection point?

I then do my waiter bit. This involves picking up a plate, or two, from the kitchen, walking a few paces into the dining room/back parlour and depositing them on the newly-revealed table. At this point, I usually say to the children: “It would be nice, for once, if we all started eating at the same time.”

I sneer and depart to collect two more plates.

See? It’s easy, or rather the function of delivering food to a table is easy. Less easy is the mood-setting schmoozing stuff, which I don’t need to bother with at home because I’m so hideously popular.

It is this aspect of service, the performance and artifice, which is the real killer because if it is done properly it doesn’t seem like performance or artifice at all.

In fact, you don’t know it’s happened. It’s a glorious illusion, Paul McKenna-ish. Click! (fingers snap): “And you’re back in the room ... and here’s your bill for our £120-a-head tasting menu. Thank you so much, sir. Always a pleasure to see you, Mr McComb.”

So service is easy, in a difficult way.

Oddly, it wasn’t the deportment, efficiency or politeness of the staff that used to be the problem at Asha’s in Birmingham: it was the food. It just wasn’t very good, bordering on poor, and in the case of some dishes (I remember in particular a strong-flavoured, “high” tasting lamb curry) nudging into plain unpleasant territory.

What a difference a refocused management team and an invigorated, crack chef can make. The place has been transformed from a style-over-substance image-obsessed joint to place that delivers great food with, yes, impeccable service.

There is always fierce competition for the mantle of best Indian food in Birmingham.

Curry, of course, is a phenomenally popular cuisine across the country, perhaps nowhere more so than in Birmingham where I contend we have the best range of outlets and the highest standards, quite possibly, of any comparable European city.

There might be swankier Michelin-star Indian restaurants in London but the capital comes a poor second when it comes to range, particularly when mapped against population size.

Set against an intoxicating backdrop of bhunas, kebabs, dals and paranthas, who is the best? I can think of five Indian restaurants, off the top of my head, where I would be happy to take people, depending on the occasion, and I can’t think of that for any other cuisine in the city.

Asha’s is bang in the mix. I haven’t had a finer curry in Birmingham. This place is now very much at the top level.

You won’t meet a nicer, more committed head chef than Guneet Singh Bindra. Every so often he will appear in the capacious, exotically lit dining room to talk effortlessly with guests.

Guneet takes great interest in what goes on out front as well as in the kitchen and he actually (ready for this?) values customer feedback, good or bad, and if necessary does something about it.

Really though Guneet hardly needs to worry about the dining room, where the smart, helpful staff are superbly marshalled by general manager Jaimon George, who’s a fireball of enthusiasm. Jaimon’s ethos for delivering attentive, efficient service permeates the team.

Our waiter for the night, Sachin, is one of many star players. You can always tell the quality of a waiter by the way he or she reacts with children.

Sachin made our girls feel relaxed and special, without treating them like lobotomised idiots à la Harvester, circa 1992 (“Everything all right with you kiddies? Smashing! Would you like some red sauce with that?” Mad gurn and smiley thumbs-up gesture ...)