An Indian restaurant that currently shares the ground floor of a well-known public house in Birmingham city centre is to create 25 jobs by launching its own venue.
The Indian Café Racer has been based at The Wellington Hotel & Pub at the corner of Bromsgrove Street's junction with the A38 Bristol Street southbound since 2022.
Although restaurant reviewers have highly praised the street-kitchen style food, the current venue has become known as Birmingham’s ‘hidden gem’ because of its location behind curtains within the pub.
Now the owner of Indian Café Racer is finalising the fitting out of his second premises a few doors down at 88-90 Bristol Street, in the former premises of Quarter House Coffee, the café-roastery which moved to the Jewellery Quarter in 2023.
A spokesperson for the founder of Indian Café Racer, a food entrepreneur who built up his restaurant experience working at the Pushkar Indian restaurant on Broad Street, said: “We hope to open our second venue in early spring.
“We’ve had tremendous success at the Wellington but we often don’t have the space to accommodate all the customers who are keen to dine with us. We are planning for our second venue just down the road to become our main restaurant to attract even more customers.
“We currently have eleven staff working here at the Wellington venue, and we plan to keep this running at the same time as opening the second restaurant. The new Indian Café Racer will employ around 25 staff, ranging from chefs to waiters, and we can’t wait to open.”
Julia Robinson, general manager of Southside Business Improvement District (BID), said: “We’re so thrilled that the Indian Café Racer is now expanding its operations into a second venue on Southside.
“Things are now set to really take off for Indian Café Racer from its own premises as well as the original space in The Wellington Hotel, and we wish them all the very best for a successful future.”
The deal to open the new Indian Café Racer has been struck with Charles Gillett, commercial property partner of Pennycuick Collins, which handles lettings for The Gooch Estate, the same landlord that owns The Wellington Hotel.
