Rambagh Palace: Suvarna Mahal in Jaipur, the royal Indian dinner

Look up before looking at the menu. High ceilings, gilded mirrors and Florentine frescoes frame Suvarna Mahal; the official hotel description places it in an 18th-century-styled palace ballroom. The menu tells of a royal banquet room furnished with Italian chandeliers and alabaster lamps. For a couple marking an occasion, the room is a substantial part of the reason to come: choose an evening when you want to dress for dinner and linger over the cooking.

The kitchen’s map has 3 centres: Rajasthan, Awadh and Punjab. Its menu describes slow cooking as the guiding method and names the princely kitchens as its inspiration. That is useful when ordering. Rajasthan brings local beans, gram-flour dumplings and Mathania chillies; Awadh brings kebabs and dum-cooked lamb; Punjab brings breads, dairy and black lentils. You can follow one region through the meal, or choose a starter and a main from different parts of that map.

Rajputana Laal Maas uses lamb, Mathania chilli extract, yoghurt, browned onions, whole spices and ghee. Safed Maas takes lamb in a different direction, with a silky, nut-enriched sauce. Those descriptions give a better way to choose than the colour of the dish alone: the first places chilli at the centre, while the second draws its richness from nuts. Discuss heat and allergies with your waiter before ordering either; the menu specifically asks diners to declare food allergies and restrictions.

There is a substantial vegetarian meal here. Kathal Pepper Fry puts pulled jackfruit, browned onions, mint and pickled onion rings inside mini sheermal tacos. Shekhawati Gattey is built around gram-flour dumplings with mustard, chillies, yoghurt and fenugreek. Sangri Dakh Khada Masala brings wild beans, pickling spices and raisins. These are dishes worth choosing in their own right, particularly for someone who wants the meal to introduce ingredients associated with Rajasthan.

For a richer vegetarian direction, Phuldhari Kofta encloses prunes and pistachios inside cottage-cheese dumplings, with a nut-enriched curry and gold leaf. Bhuna Palak Paneer combines barbecued cottage cheese with spinach, garlic, burrata and malai. Dal Suvarna Mahal adds black lentils, kidney beans, milk and white butter. Dairy and nuts run through this part of the menu, so a vegetarian booking still needs a specific conversation if anyone also avoids milk or nuts.

Bread is a course of decisions of its own. Truffle and Brie Cheese Kulcha has the obvious richness of cheese and truffle; Khameeri Roti uses cultured dough; Naan Suvarna Mahal carries red chilli, nigella, jalapeño, sesame, coriander and mint. Bajre ki Roti is millet bread with ghee. Choose the bread alongside the sauce you order, and ask which preparation suits your dietary needs. The menu gives ingredients, making that conversation more precise than simply asking for bread.

Finish with something that keeps the meal in the same register. Shahi Tukda is bread soaked in saffron milk and layered with rabdi, nuts and rose petals; Mawa Malai Ghewar adds saffron rabdi, nuts and gold leaf. Assamese Black Rice Kheer is cooked in milk and scented with rose. The dessert list also offers poached pears with saffron, honey, cardamom and rose-petal ice cream. Someone avoiding dairy should flag that before settling on this ending.

Suvarna Mahal is the choice for a formal Indian dinner. Verandah Café suits an afternoon at a table facing the grounds, while Steam puts a lounge bar aboard a restored train carriage. Decide which setting you want when you contact the palace.