Critic's Review
For some reason, I got the idea for Indian food today. I'm not a huge fan, but I do enjoy a good buffet. I had something to do in Western Pompano, so I made the additional trek to Lauderhill to try Indian Chillies.
There's not much going on in the shopping center, so there was plenty of parking. They have some interesting stuff out front. Too bad the fountain wasn't functional.
When I walked in, there's a bar to the right and the buffet front and center. The place reminded me of one of those halls you rent out for a special event; or one of those finished basements back in the 70s with the bad tile floors. Two other tables were occupied; one of which got in just before I did at about 2:05pm.
I ordered an iced tea, which is a mistake in an Indian Restaurant. The concept of "lemon" seemed to confuse my server, and she brought me tea with a slice of lime. "I put some lemon juice in for you". Great. You have a full bar and you don't have lemons?
The tea was awful. I asked for some sweeteners; just white and pink. More of that 70s feel.
I headed over to the buffet to scope it out. I just grabbed stuff from the first 5 stations.
Chicken Biryani, Butter Chicken, Tandoori Chicken, Naan, Paratha (fried bread). The Tandoori was cold but ok; I don't know how chicken sitting in a sauce could be dry, but they figured it out. The butter chicken had no taste at all. The Naan wasn't hot or fresh but was fine; the fried bread was soggy, cold and inedible.
I went back to look in some of the other chafing dishes. Apparently I'd tried everything in the non-vegetarian section. All that was left was vegetarian dishes which I'll call "slop". No lamb, goat, seafood or curries available.
Daal Makhani (Lentils), Chana Masala (chickpeas), Saag Paneer (spinach with cheese), and an unlabeled cabbage dish (Patta Gobhi?). As with most vegetarian food, this stuff was mostly edible but wholly uninteresting. Not much taste throughout. The spinach was ice cold. It might have been good hot, but cold creamed spinach is a no-go.
The ambiance was really starting to tick me off. They had some sort of Bollywood party channel on the TVs, creating the ultimate dining Hell.
My hunger had yet to be even dented. I went over to the salad bar to have a look. They had a lot of weird dressings; nothing traditional. I wasn't going to like them, and I didn't want to eat dry lettuce. I went back to the buffet to look for scraps.
They had a bunch of deep friend stuff that was unlabeled. "Onions and potatoes" the woman said. Ok, I'll try them. I fished a chicken leg out of the Chicken Biryani. There were only 3 pieces of Tandoori left, all looking very old. I also grabbed some more Naan.
At this point I knew I was just trying to store enough fuel to get home so I could make some food. The chicken looked like a big piece, but it was a back, and there was almost no meat. I didn't like the fritters. How can you ruin deep friend onions?
There was an unlabeled chafing dish, with some sort of crepes. Without knowing the filling, I wasn't sure if it was dessert or not. I grabbed one and also got a dough ball for dessert.
The hostess who I suspect was the owner was nearby so I called her over and asked what was in the crepe; potatoes as it turns out (Masala Dosa). I skillfully avoided her "How is the Food?" question during the exchange.
The information allowed me to try the crepe before the dough ball for dessert. Sadly the crepe was cold and stiff.
The Gulub Jamun, which is fried dough in a sweet syrup, was the final nail in the coffin. While the syrup was hot, the ball had been sitting for WAY too long, rendering itself inedible.
I asked for the check and I was gone. Service was fine, but I can't leave a full tip at a buffet. I didn't get a refill, but I barely drank half of the tea.
Conclusion
When you look at the menu here, it sounds like they have some good food. But very few menu items are available on the buffet. Not enough meat dishes, the buffet isn't fresh at 2pm, and the food isn't kept warm. They didn't put any food out after 2pm, and they didn't seem concerned that many items were depleted and too old to eat.
While I understand that they can't fill a buffet for 4 people, the answer is to go somewhere else unless you're a vegetarian and you get here very early. A guy came in just as I was leaving; I'm not sure there was any meat left in the buffet.
I'm also not sure how they got the name of the restaurant. There's nothing spicy here.