Saturday, March 28, 2009

India's Oven

454A rue Jean-Talon Ouest
Montréal, Québec
514.509.8678

My sister L and her boyfriend D love Indian food. They went to India's Oven the previous week and enjoyed it so much they wanted to go again. Since my mom's husband H also enjoys Indian food, we decided to meet up on a Thursday night - my mom is not a fan of Indian food.



The restaurant wasn't too busy but there was a large group near us. The staff served us water and brought us a wine opener when they noticed we brought wine (it's a bring your own wine restaurant). However, we had to ask for menus before they brought us some, maybe because we were still waiting for H. While the appetizers came quickly, it took a while for the main dishes. L & D also experienced slow service the previous week.

We decided on our usual two Indian appetizers: samosas and pakoras. The samosas, for $2.99, were stuffed with the usual potatoes and peas. The vegetable pakoras ($3.99) had a lot of vegetables (and not just batter like they sometimes are).



We ordered 5 curries and each came with one naan bread. Naan breads usually have to be ordered separately at other Indian restaurants, for $1-2 each, so this was a nice saving. We were asked what level of spiciness we preferred and decided on spicy, which was perfect for me and maybe a bit too slightly for L.



We ordered two chicken dishes: butter chicken for $9.99 and the tikka masala for $9.99. We also ordered three vegetarian dishes: chana masala (chickpeas) for $7.99, mutter paneer (peas and cheese) for $9.99 and baingan bartan (eggplant) for $8.99.



Top left, going clockwise: mutter paneer, baingan bartan, chana masala and chicken tikka masala. (The butter chicken photo was too blurry.)

Ordering 2 appetizers and 5 main dishes was more than enough for four people. While each curry dish seems similar, we enjoyed each of them. It's all about the sauce and dipping your naan bread in it. We had a concessus that the bartan dish was our favourite; it had a sweetness we all enjoyed. We also really enjoyed the dense pieces of paneer in the mutter paneer. I liked that the butter chicken was more shredded rather than the usual cubes of chicken. Definitely worth going back, with expectations of slow service.

India's Oven on Urbanspoon

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Undobtedly the worst food and service I have had in my life. The owner is rude and stupid. He served the wrong food and when I informed me of his mistake he started threatening us. We found a peace of metal in the stew and intstead of apologising he accused us of putting it on our plate ourselves. Never got to this restaurant even if it is the last restaurant on earth.

figaro said...

i just saw your comment and i agree with you i just come from of there and we find a cocroach in ours beef cury

Anonymous said...

The only cockroach is you figaro...learn how to spell and write before you criticize someones place of business!

Anonymous said...

Having been there a few times, I have to say that I am more than willing to support the poor service for the great food. They have increased their prices which I think was unnecessary. The owner was pretty nice to us, apologized when there have been mistakes but doesn't seem to keen on improving the service.

Anonymous said...

Good food. Outlandishly rude service. After a positive take-out experience, my wife and I decided to return to this restaurant and dine in with a visiting house guest. We ate the vegetarian samosas, butter chicken, lamb korma, saag paneer, and garlic naan, all of which tasted quite delicious. After receiving the bill, which seemed unexpectedly high, we payed, left a generous tip, and upon spotting the owner (who was also our server) towards a quiet area near the back of the restaurant, I approached him discreetly to verify that we had been charged the correct amount for all we had ordered. It was then discovered that we had in fact been accidentally charged for several items that we had not ordered. This was also verified by the other server working in the restaurant. The owner at first seemed confused, unable to recall our commands, and then, instead of correcting the error, he fervently began accusing us of lying to him. At this inappropriate and inaccurate accusation I politely requested my tip back and prepared to leave. In the minutes that followed the owner commenced shouting strings of the most vile and offensive profanities imaginable, both at me and my wife who had by this point joined my side. After enduring this abuse for several minutes, my wife and I returned to our table to wait for the fanatical man to recompose himself. He soon after returned, violently threw a $20 bill onto our table, began cursing loud profanities at us again in front of the other patrons and demanded that we leave. Needless to say, I can’t recommend this experience to anyone with sensitive ears.

viagra online said...

say that Indian food is good too, if as shown in this blog so if you must be very good!