kababs

lunch buffet. buffet had a nice presentation but very limited space and limited items. all items on main buffet dishes were cooked to same spice temp.ricewas long grain and not a saffronricewhich would have been. bread pudding ( not southern style) was great for a desert. i would say a better dinner than lunch kind of restaurant.

certainly room for improvement. i an not a connoisseur of indian food, just a local on a date night with my wife. she had the lamb kababs marinated with garlic and spices with a side of naan, and i had the daal fry (lentils finished with browned garlic, green chilies, and coriander leaves) with a side of rice.

there was only 1 other customer when we entered, tuesday night at 8, maybe this is normal customer volume the day of the week and time? the waitress was sitting at a table with presumably her boyfriend, which is perhaps acceptable with a low customer volume? she got up to seat us and take our order, then returned to her table, getting up occasionally to refill our drinks and then bring our order when it was prepared, and the check when we were done. it kind of felt like half-hearted service to me.

the lamb kababs with naan side did not seem like a complete meal to us. it was really just 4 or 5 pieces of (broiled or grilled) lamb on a garnish if lettuce. no additional vegetables. when we do kababs at home we add onions, mushrooms, bell peppers, zucchini, tomatoes... i do not know what a traditional indian kabab consists of, but we both were expecting some veggies with the lamb kabab to complete the meal. the flavor and texture was only okay.

my daal fry was good, but the side ofricewas the star of the evening. there were seeds in the rice, i suspect cumin, and other seasonings that made thericeabsolutely delicious.

i guess that kind of sums up our experience at the restaurant, if the side ofricecan be the highlight of the meal, then there is certainly be room for improvement in all other areas...

amazing..... my friend and i went to kebabs for my birthday dinner last night....we had found a web page that said they were open until 10:00 p.m., but apparently it was outdated. they closed at 9 pm. the next door over, someone was holding a door open and invited us into the olives and pitas restaurant. i'll cut to the chase to say that we were about halfway through our amazing meal before we found out they were not really open, they were having a family dinner and had invited us inside anyway. their generosity and hospitality brought tears to my eyes, what nice people! they never made us feel like a burden or unwelcome. we talked about that for hours after our meal!

now that you know what amazing people they are, i can get to the food part. we both ordered curry (mine was chicken, his shrimp) and asked for it spicy; it sure was! but not in a 'hot just to be hot' way, it was so incredibly savory and delicious that the heat just made you slow down a little. (i might mention the iced tea was some of the freshest tasting i've ever had!) i also had asked for veggies instead ofricewith the curry, and they brought me beautifully roasted and irresistable squash and peppers with seasonings. i'm very picky and usually leave a restaurant thinking wow, i could have made this at home, but guaranteed i'll be bringing my husband and other family here now! this food was some of the freshest and best prepared i've ever had.

what is this?. i have never had indian food before, and i think today will be my last adventure at trying it. we had the lunch buffet, and used our $10 living social deal for $20 worth of food. i suppose it is fairly priced, the buffet was $8.99 for all you can eat and they had about 12 different lunch items, rice, salad, and dessert options. i had the mint lemonade, which was good, but not very minty, however it was $2.99- i say stick with water here. the naan bread taste like, well- nothing. the jasminericewas good. the chicken dishes were all made with chicken thighs (cheap, and very fatty). i suppose if i knew what the ingrediants were in the food, i may have been able to eat more, but the only thing i found familar and that i could even swallow was the veggies in tomato sauce. our bill came out to $24.91 for 2 lunch buffets and 2 drinks.

great! but..... i am generally unimpressed with the indian restaurants in wichita, but this is a good one with a few caveats.

their food is good, by and large. some of it is excellent. the kormas and chicken tikka masala are good. if something has cream as an ingredient, expect it to be in american proportions (speaking of which, from my limited experience with indian food, i doubt that this stuff is very traditional, mostly due to cream content).

my most recent trip, i tried the biryani (spicy rice). excellent! think friedricemade with yoghurt sauce (i think) and indian-style spicing. very spicy when i had it, though i'll bet they'd tone it down if asked.

my one disappointing meal here was saag paneer, which is something i usually like. i don't know whether they used ghee or cream, but there wasn't nearly enough (for a change). there was no spiciness, either the hot kind or otherwise. bland. barely any paneer, either.

the following are my main complaints:
service is spotty. the last trip, 3/4 meals had an error (messing up spice levels on two and wrong meat in one). the server was new, though, and she claimed that one error was the kitchen's fault. it seems like we have a new server every time we go.

the buffet is... well... bad. i'm surprised to see the positive votes for it here. i don't know what goes wrong when they are cooking in large masses, but something is just off. it isn't disgusting, but nothing i would pay money for.