As part of the International Day of Birminghams, our Birmingham’s own iconic dish, the Balti, was celebrated when legendary Balti restaurant, Shababs, cooked up ‘the BAB’ featuring ingredients popular in Birmingham, Alabama … fried chicken, butter beans and peanut butter.

Tested out by members of the iconic Brummie band, UB40, (who all originally hailed from the Balti Triangle area), they gave this unique dish their seal of approval.

Maybe their next hit single could be ‘Balti In The Kitchen’!

The Birmingham Balti has been submitted under the food category on this UNESCO approved UK scheme. Having passed the first of three stages, there has been an understandable delay due to the summer holiday period but news on the second stage is expected soon.

However, DCMS, the government department taking the lead, are already looking at how any approved applications might work in terms of safeguarding approved applications i.e. tackling the imposters! This will be an interesting (and very important) issue!