"I'D always thought the idea of running a restaurant hellish," says Nisha Katona, the former barrister and self-proclaimed 'curry evangelist' behind Indian street food outfit Mowgli. "I could always return to the Bar, but this is where my heart is now."

Do you know what? I wish I'd never attached the term 'street food' to Mowgli

Katona, a sharp and striking 43-year-old mother of two, recently jacked-in a twenty-year career as a barrister to focus on Indian street food restaurant, Mowgli, which first launched on Liverpool's booming Bold Street in October 2014.

Now the restaurateur, author and cooking tutor has announced plans to open the second Mowgli in Manchester's £30m redeveloped Corn Exchange - alongside the likes of Wahaca, Pho and Vapiano - this September.

.Nisha Katona

"I've seen what British people eat in Indian restaurants - it's not real Indian food," she says, "people deserve more and with Mowgli we can offer it to them."

Evangelist indeed. Though speaking to Katona, you do get the impression that unlike life at the Bar, this is no job, this is duty. Obsession even.

"I'm pathological about food," she says, "and this is what people are yelling out for; authenticity. Not prepackaged authenticity but the type of food you'd find in an Indian family kitchen, or on the street."

READ LIVERPOOL CONFIDENTIAL'S REVIEW OF MOWGLI

Ah 'street food'. There it is again. Is Katona worried she'll get lumped in with the current flood of half-arsed, full-service restaurants serving bastardised street food?

"Do you know what? I wish I'd never attached the term 'street food' to Mowgli," she admits. "I never wanted to open a fad restaurant, I lay awake in bed at night wondering whether to drop 'street' altogether."

"But then I think why should I?" she continues. "Indian's don't eat in restaurants - a billion Indians eat street food every single day."

At least Katona's prices remain street, with most dishes - including a curious selection of 'Tamarind Water Bombs', 'Calcutta Cabbage Tangle' and 'Himalayan Cheese Toast ('the best cheese on toast you'll ever taste') - sitting around the £3-£6 mark. Equally interesting are Mowgli's tiffin boxes for one (from £10); '4 tiers of veg, non veg and carb offerings chosen by the Chef' on the day. Food roulette.

.Mowgli will open in the Corn Exchange in September

Still, this is a risk for Katona, one she acknowledges. "Everything I own and earned and saved is in this," she says. "Whatever risk I took in Liverpool, I'm doubling it now in Manchester."

She ain't kidding. It recently came to light that rents for new restaurant space in the Corn Exchange were among the highest anywhere in the city - up to £50 per square foot. And, unlike Liverpool, Manchester already has one hugely popular Indian street food restaurant in (nearly namesake) Mughli, and another snapping at its heels with Spinningfields' newbie, Scene Indian Kitchen.

Of course, there's also the small matter of competiting against sixteen other new Corn Exchange restaurants within a building that has flapped and failed under its previous two guises.

"There's no doubt the scene here is rammed," says Katona, "but we don't see the other restaurants here as competition, in fact, it's an opportunity. We're hoping to pinch a few punters away from the big boys."

Gumption. We like that.

Mowgli will launch in the Corn Exchange on Exchange Square in September 2015.