After 25 years, Cowley Road stalwarts Cocos and Aziz are staying ahead of the game. Katherine MacAlister discovers why

It's been a year of celebrating and reminiscing on Cowley Road as two of its oldest and most popular restaurants Cocos and Aziz celebrate 25 years in business.

Mr Aziz (Aziz Ur-Rahman), who has just handed over the reins to his son Abdul, reflected that when he and Clinton Pugh of Cocos opened up on East Oxford’s now famous foodie strip, it was a culinary wasteland.

That they are still here as Cowley Road continues to morph into an eclectic and ethnic culinary hotspot says more about these two pioneers than anything else.

Revisiting both restaurants I noted that they continue to provide fun, intelligent food while regularly adapting to their changing landscape.

As if to reiterate this, the Aziz has extended its all-day Sunday buffet well into the night and introduced a #meatfree Monday.

The Monday menu is therefore entirely vegetarian and as interesting as you would hope.

The thali, which arrives as a collection of silver bowls, costs £14 and consists of a starter, two mains, two side dishes and any rice and naan.

Throwing caution to the wind we went native and tried a bit of everything.

Particular dishes we had never tried, others featured vegetables we had never heard of – karela, potol anyone?

Some dishes were exquisite (the pushkas were mini crispy shells filled with curry), others quirky (sweet pumpkins cooked in spices and herbs) others utterly unique (vada dumplings with dahl and chilli).

Either way it meant you got to try something new and throw the rule book out of the window.

No chicken tikka masala here!

The dosas stole the show – thin Indian crepes filled with dry curry and served with two dips; a samba lentil and a mango spinach – which were remarkably good.

Cocos has made similar inroads.

The menu had traditionally consisted of pizzas, pasta and salads but Clinton has recently introduced steaks, burgers and ribs to the menu a well as a delicious brunch selection.

The pizzas remain as legendary as ever but the new additions mean Cocos has become much more attractive to the more carnivorous among us, being all things to all people.

It makes you wonder why Clinton didn’t do this years ago, because he knows all about meat, having opened the short-lived Oxford Organic Burger Company a few doors up, where the food was superb but the concept too revolutionary and pricey for this neck of the woods.

Having amalgamated the two, Cocos is still as busy, fun and atmospheric as ever, with its legendary clown sculptures right up there with Headington’s shark, and the cocktails still reigning supreme.

During my last two visits we tried both the burgers (£9.95 with chips and superfood salad or coleslaw) which was not only ridiculously good value for money but seriously delicious, and the £14.75 8oz Scotch rump steak with skinny chips and a tomato and rocket salad (sauces optional).

Both were juicy, succulent, generous and ingredient-led.

Pizza-wise there are some new additions – prawn saganaki with king prawns, feta, tomato and spring onions, (£9.55), my favourite, the Greek pizza (£9.45), which now has a dollop of tsatsiki on it, as does the merguez pizza, with lamb and beef spicy sausage with spinach, onions, peppers, mozzarella (£9.75) So congratulations to these two doyennes of Cowley Road and let’s they hope they keep on trucking for another 25 years, because East Oxford would be a forlorn place without them.

Aziz, 
230 Cowley Road, Oxford 01865 794945 
Cocos, 
23 Cowley Road, Oxford 01865 200232