As a cub reporter on a local newspaper, I never used to see the editor much. He mostly stayed in his corner office, venturing out only occasionally. In the space of a month, the manager of the football club (then in the Premiership) and the town’s MP both arrived unexpectedly at the newspaper’s reception desk. Rather than going to see them, however, he stayed in his room and sent his deputy to talk on his behalf. He had an unusual trait for an editor: shyness.

There are two edicts from him that I remember clearly from my two years at the paper. Firstly, when he told me that the readers would not know what a word I had used in a diamond wedding story was. The word was octogenarian. And secondly, an email he sent out instructing all editorial staff never again to refer to an Indian restaurant in print as a curry house, following an angry exchange with a proprietor.

I was reminded of this instruction while waiting for a table at the Brunel Raj in Clifton last night. In the narrow entrance hall are several frames packed full of press coverage for the curry house, sorry, Indian restaurant, that Justin Lee Collins once praised live on the Chris Moyles show.

JLC is not the only celebrity endorsement. Lee from Blue is pictured next to the owners, and the small woman in a baseball cap also pictured turns out to be Jennifer Love Hewitt, presumably visiting while filming The Truth About Love in the vicinity.

Numerous press cuttings from newspapers and magazines include a story from the Daily Star of a Bristol student who eats a curry every day and names the Brunel Raj as his favourite local Indian.

You’re not an Indian restaurant worth your salt if you don’t have a ringing endorsement from your local paper on the wall and/or a well-known face gurning at you as the staff gather round and put on their most serious faces.

My favourite endorsement in Bristol is a faded newspaper story in the window of one of my favourite Indians, the Lal Jomi in Redland, where former Bristol and England rugby player Jonathan Webb claims that his pre-match preparations are enhanced by a vindaloo at this Harcourt Road establishment.

A classic of the genre in terms of local newspaper coverage can be found at the New Taj on the Gloucester Road, where Evening Post reporter Kirsty Pugh sniffed out a story about their flu-indaloo curry, which the chef claimed helped get rid of colds.

Enticing eaters in with spurious stories or praise from local celebrities is one thing. A new Indian restaurant due to open soon on the corner of King Street and Welsh Back is offering an even more enticing proposition. Namaskar Lounge, on the site of the ill-fated Mu Mu’s, is currently offering as a competition prize on their website an all-expenses paid trip for two to Mumbai. Shy people need not enter.

So what is Bristol’s best curry house? My vote goes to Kohi Noor on Blackboy Hill.