Large Orders that We Deliver – Leaves in an Electric Car
How the best Indian restaurant in Covent Garden gets your food across London
Restaurants talk about sustainability in the abstract. Recycled napkins. A line on the menu about locally sourced where possible. It is usually well-meant and almost always unmeasurable.
We wanted to change something we could actually count. So when it came time to sort out how our large orders get across London — the office lunches, the fifty-cover boardroom spreads, the family celebrations that come to your table instead of ours — we bought a fully electric car to do it. Every big order that leaves our kitchen now goes out in a Renault 4 E-Tech.
No diesel. No exhaust. Just fifty portions of slow-cooked lamb shank arrived in EC2 without adding anything to the air on the way.
Why An Electric Car And Not A Moped
The obvious question. Most restaurant delivery in central London happens on two wheels, and for a single curry it makes sense.
Large orders are a different problem. A twenty-person office lunch means stacked hot boxes, rice containers, breads that need to stay warm and flat, and chutneys that need to arrive as chutneys rather than as an incident. That needs a boot, a flat floor and a controlled ride. Historically it also meant a small diesel van idling on a double yellow outside your building.
The Renault 4 E-Tech solves both halves. It has a proper 375-litre boot with the seats up and far more with them down, so a genuinely large order travels in one piece and in one trip. And it produces no tailpipe emissions at all while doing it.
The Numbers, Because Vague Claims Are Worthless
Here is what we can actually stand behind:
• Fully electric. A 52 kWh battery with an official WLTP range of around 250 miles. Our longest delivery run is a fraction of that, so the car does a full week of London orders on very few charges.
• Zero tailpipe emissions. Nothing comes out of the back of it, on your street or ours. Central London’s air quality problem is largely a road transport problem, and this is the part of it we control.
• ULEZ compliant, which matters given that the zone now covers all of Greater London — we can reach a customer in Zone 4 without an emissions charge and without passing one on to you.
• Charged overnight, when grid demand and carbon intensity are at their lowest.
• One trip, not three. The boot capacity is the quiet sustainability story here. A large order that fits in one car is a large order that doesn’t become three separate scooter runs.
What Counts As A Large Order
We deliver large orders across zone 1 and 2 of London including office and corporate lunches — from a working lunch for ten to a full floor. Not to mention:
• Meetings, launches and client entertaining
• Home celebrations — birthdays, Eid, engagement parties, family gatherings
• Film and production catering
Minimum order for delivery is £200 and we ask for 5 hours notice on larger jobs so the kitchen can build it properly rather than squeezing it between service. Everything travels in insulated boxes and arrives hot. Set menus, per-head pricing and dietary requirements — vegetarian, vegan, nut-free, and our full menu is halal — are all straightforward. Just tell us when you order.
What We Haven’t Fixed Yet
I would rather be honest about the rest of it than pretend one car makes us a green restaurant.
A commercial kitchen running six tandoors and a full gas range is an energy-hungry thing, and ours is no exception. Our packaging is recyclable and compostable. We’re working on food waste one day at a time, and there is more to do on both.
The delivery car is the piece we could change immediately and completely, so we changed it. The rest is in progress, and I would rather tell you where we actually are than put a leaf logo on the menu and call it done.
And The Food Itself
None of this matters if what turns up isn’t worth eating.
Paro serves the food of West Bengal — the cooking I grew up with, built for a 130-cover dining room in the middle of the West End. Char and smoke from the tandoor, mustard oil, panch phoron, curries built slowly over hours rather than assembled to order. It’s the food of a home kitchen, cooked at the scale of a proper restaurant.
If you’re looking for the best Indian restaurant in Covent Garden to feed your office, your clients or your family, we’d like the chance.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you deliver large orders across London?
Yes. We cover zone 1 and 2 for orders over £200, delivered in our fully electric Renault 4 E-Tech.
How much notice do you need for a large order?
5 hours for larger jobs.
Is Paro’s food halal?
Yes, our full menu is halal.
Will the food still be hot when it arrives?
Everything travels in insulated hot boxes and the car carries a whole order in one trip, so nothing sits waiting for a second run.
Can you cater for vegetarians, vegans and allergies?
Yes. Tell us when you order and we’ll build the menu around it.
Is the electric delivery an extra cost?
No. It’s how we deliver — there’s no premium for it.
How far can you deliver?
The car has around 250 miles of range, so distance isn’t the constraint — food quality on arrival is, and that’s what sets our zone.
