Mocktails in Northwood Hills

Classic Mojito is lemon, lime and mint. It is the sharp one, and the one to order if you find most soft drinks too sweet.

Blue Lagoon is lemon, blueberry, lime and mint. It is bright blue and it does not pretend otherwise, and it is the one to order if you want something sweeter than the mojito.

Strawberry Haven is strawberry, peach, lemon, cranberry and mint. The most fruit in one glass on this list, and the sweetest of the four.

Passion Breeze is mango, passion fruit, lime and mint.

All four are £5.95, so nobody has to compare prices, and all four come with mint in them.

They are served tall and cold with a straw. They arrive quickly, which makes them the right thing to order at the start of a meal rather than after it.

If you are ordering for a table, the Family Platter at £49.95 includes four mocktails alongside four samosas, four seekh kebabs, two biryanis, two loaded chips and any two fresh parathas.

If £5.95 is more than you want to spend on a drink, the Nimbu Pani range is £3.00 and does a similar job. Lemon & Lime, Lemon & Strawberry, and Lemon & Raspberry.

Nimbu pani is lemon water, sharpened, and it is the drink you actually want with something spiced. The menu board notes that it has gone viral on TikTok, which explains why a table of four sometimes orders four of them at once.

At £3.00 each, four nimbu pani costs less than two mocktails.

The difference between the two is body. A mocktail has more fruit in it and drinks like a dessert. A nimbu pani is thinner and sharper and works better across a whole meal.

If you are eating Samosa Chaat at £6.95 or Loaded Chips at £6.95, order a nimbu pani. If you are sitting for two hours over a milkcake at £6.95 and a game of ludo, order a mocktail.

Other cold drinks: Mango Lassi £3.00, canned drinks £1.50, water bottle £1.50.

The smoothies are all £5.95 and there are three. Passion Storm is passion fruit, peach, pineapple and guava. Passion Glow is pineapple, papaya and mango. Berry Breeze is raspberry, apple, mango and blueberry.

They are thicker than the mocktails, and closer to a light dessert than a drink.

Fresh juice is £4.95 and freshly squeezed to order in Orange, Apple, Pineapple or Watermelon. That is the one to order in the morning with a Desi Breakfast at £8.95 or a Masala Omelette at £4.95.

So the cold non-dairy range runs from £3.00 for a nimbu pani, through £4.95 for a juice, to £5.95 for a smoothie or a mocktail. All of it is alcohol free, because the entire shop is.

If you want dairy, the milkshakes start at £4.95 and the Cha Cha Chai Special is £5.95. Gelato Shakes are £5.95 and are blended from any of the gelato flavours.

Cha Cha Chai does not serve alcohol. That is not a licensing accident or a temporary position, it is what the shop is. Everything is halal, and there is a halal roundel on the entrance door.

In practice that changes who the room is for. Nobody is choosing between a bar and a café here, because this does the job of both. Groups come in at nine in the evening and stay past eleven. Families sit at the same tables as people who have come straight from work.

It also means a mocktail at £5.95 is a real order rather than the consolation option on a wine list. The four on the board are the drinks list, not the substitute for one.

The tables have ludo and snakes and ladders printed into the marble, and the booths are velvet, so a round of mocktails tends to turn into a longer evening than planned.

On Friday and Saturday we serve until midnight, which is when this matters most.

Cha Cha Chai Northwood Hills is at 56 Joel Street, Northwood Hills, Northwood HA6 1PA. We are directly opposite Northwood Hills station on the Metropolitan line, roughly thirty seconds from the platform exit.

The H11 and 282 buses stop on Joel Street outside the door. There is free and pay-and-display parking on Joel Street and the surrounding side roads.

We open at 9:00 seven days a week. Monday to Thursday and Sunday we serve until 23:00, and Friday and Saturday until midnight.

If you are bringing a group, the room is laid out for it, with big tables and booths, and the kitchen does catering, family platters and Iftar boxes. Send the details through the enquiry form on the contact page or call 01923 918456, and give as much notice as you can for a large order.

Mocktails are on Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats as well, though a tall cold drink with ice in it is one of the things that is genuinely better collected than delivered.