Tandoori Grill Restaurant Marlborough MA Is Poor

I don’t want to say this for any restaurant as I never want to criticize any food until and unless it is really bad and pathetic. But, the dining and food experience at Tandoori Grill was as bad as it could get.

Tandoori Grill Marlborough MA

If you search on the Google for ‘Indian restaurant in marlborough MA‘, chances are that you would find Tandoori Grill on top. That’s exactly what happened with us as well and we thought that it would be as good as its rating on Google search.

As a matter of fact, On our first visit to Marlborough, we did try getting into the restaurant for a lunch meal on a sunny Saturday. Fortunately, Maahi sighted that there was not a single desi in the dining room and she immediately shouted that this is going to be bad for us!
Yes, we did turn-around and went to eat at some other place that day.

But, since we were residing in Marlborough for some time, we did got unlucky to dine at the Saturday night Buffet; the other weekend. We were highly skeptical about its food as there was again zero desi presence and with just 4 tables occupied (non-desi). Anyhow, we decided to get inside this time and have a taste of the food.

The serving lady on that day was quite polite and quite helpful too. Looking at the desi face of ours, she excitedly informed that the dinner buffet would cost us $20.13 including all taxes. She did make it a point that the actual buffet cost is less but she is conveying the final price to make it an easier decision for us .

We did opt for the buffet thinking that if things go wrong with one dish, we would at-least have an option of trying something else. Lets quickly jump on what we tried:

The primary dishes that we tried were

1. Dal Makhani (Poor – I know it is one of the most difficult dish to prepare),
2. Chicken Vindaloo (Below Average),
3. Spicy Baigan (Average),
4. Naan (Poor – Cold, dried and stiff),
5. Idli (Average – No Coconut Chutney to go with idli ! – This was a blunder),
6. Vada (Average – Tasted Fresh)
7. Sambar (Average),
8. Vegetable Biryani (Below Average – Dried and tasted a bit raw)
9. White Rice (Average– Bearable)
10. Vegetable Raita (Good – Cold and tasted fresh)
11. Gravy Paneer (Poor – Paneer and Gravy had no match. Gravy was just boiled water with spices)
12. Tandoori Chicken (Average – Not hot, moderately roasted)

We could have digested all if the sweets portion had not blown out our mind. I have never ever tasted a sweet like this in any restaurant.

Sweets – The worst part of the whole food experience

1. Gulab Jamun (Poor– Cold as if they were taken straight out of refrigerator. Sliced into 2 pieces probably to help people take less on to their plate. Made with more of Maida and less of Mawa)
2. Moong Dal halwa (Pathetic – It had both the characteristics of an ice cube – Cold and solid shape. The chef did not even bother to heat it up before serving in dining room. We could make this out as the halwa normally solidifies into the shape of the utensil when it is stored in refrigerator.

I do not want to discourage the restaurant with this review but i think the points that i have mentioned above can hlep them at-least try improving on the basic things. I do read on the Tandoori Grill website about their business since 1999 and still can’t figure out that they are making these basic mistakes.

The ambiance of the restaurant was good with the whole environment quite and calm. I would primarily attribute this to the desi population’s absent-ism!

One more interesting thing that we noticed was that none of 4 tables that were occupied by non-desi’s opted for the dinner buffet. This was probably because they had already tasted it at-least once earlier and were not eager to give it a shot again.

Not sure if the non-buffet ordering would have made any difference to our experience here but if you had a better experience here, please do share with us in the comments.

I would rate this restaurant’s Indian food as Poor (2/5).