Punjabi Bites — Restaurant in Charlottetown

Traveller here , came after checking their menu online . Online menu says Thali veg and non veg, came in , paid for parking , ordered a non veg Thali and the hostess says only option of butter chicken which A ) I enquired is on the sweet side and B) one of the review said the butter chicken is the worst option to have .I requested maybe a different chicken which almost every Indian restaurant obliges and also option between chicken, goat ,lamb , seafood with difference in price if any . Hostess also mentioned something about timing for serving specials for dine in which again is not mentioned on menu. The menu in house or online mentions nothing about the options or timings . I asked for the manager to which the hostess sais she is the manager however the owner strictly told her to not change the option NO EXCEPTION . what kind of manager with no authority !! Or is it just the title ( working on cash student ) Poor girl I feel pity for her . I ordered a Biryani because this was also my first hot meal after a long day so don't have the energy to find another restaurant,. Shame on the owner for A) having no presence B) bad customer service ,C) improper and mis leading menu. It's the first Indian restaurant in my years who would refuse legitimate request . It's like you have to eat what we choose . Edit : The Biryani came , scooped and no sign of lamb , called the hostess and the lamb was pop corn sized 6 pieces . Left the place and came round the corner to taste of India . Posting a snippet of their Thali menu which mentions everything and the atmosphere is a lot better . Spacious . Their Thali menu says like everywhere substitution available ...shame on Punjabi bites

Edit : you are a blatant liar . Are you fooling people or are you a fool or uneducated A....le. Nowhere online menu states anything . Go to taste of India and see how a menu is described and done. As for my manners , i called you out so you are angry. Decide is she your hostess or manager (...

We found Punjabi Bites purely by accident. We'd just come back to Charlottetown after spending the day touring around the eastern coast of the province and were looking to grab a bite to eat before heading back to the hotel. We were tired, hungry and simply threw our car into the first available parking space - which just happened to be in front of Punjabi Bites.

At first glance, the place looks sketchy as hell. It's a tall, black building with blacked out windows and looked like abandoned building. There was also a straggly dude in crocks and socks smoking on the step next door and slurring some sort of story at us so we almost crossed the street and bypassed it. We just happened to notice the open sign near the door our of the corner of our eye.

We walked in and it's this cute little restaurant - nothing fancy but very homey and comfortable. And it smelled wonderful! The server was pleasant, friendly and prompt. We ordered the butter chicken, garlic naan, vegetarian samosas, mixed vegetables and tandoori roti. The food was incredible! We are snobby foodies from Montreal (ha!) and we routinely eat Indian cuisine at home. We've NEVER had butter chicken and naan like those served at Punjabi Bites! Wow! The breads were freshly made and baked in a clay oven and still had the char on them when they arrived at our table. The samosas were fragrant and tasty. The basmati rice was light and fluffy and perfectly prepared. And the butter chicken....! Just...OMG!

We are so glad we found this little gem. Definitely recommend! It would give anything we have back home in Montreal a serious run for their money. Five of the easiest stars I've ever given a...

For a Punjabi restaurant to not have Rajma or kadhi chawal on the menu dampened my excitement right away.

We ordered chicken 65, the chicken was fried with besan coating tossed in a sweet sour gravy, more like the Indo-Chinese dish you get back in India that had corn flour slurry. Nothing remotely authentic about it, can't exactly say it worked.

Hubby's beer didn't arrive until after we finished the appetizers. So we passed on that.

Ordered chicken kali mirch and Punjabi dhaba dal for main course with rice and naan. The chicken Kali mirch was mostly boiled chicken breast pieces in a cream based very very sweet gravy (the kind that comes with malai kofta), with some pepper power sprinkled on top for garnish. It wasn't spicy at all, and antithesis to the dish's name, it was too sweet. Clearly they repurposed standard gravy they probably had and tried to pass it off as any dish ordered, didn't matter which one!

The dhaba dal is actually the maa ki dal (kaali daal), it is not the usual yellow dal. I bet if we had ordered Dal Makhani from the menu instead, we would have got the same dish served.

Good things: rice and naan. Period. And the servers were kind.

None of the dishes had authentic taste. Funny enough, the gravies weren't too bad to taste - we didn't go back hungry. However I'm not sure if we'd be returning.

BTW, from the pics one would think that that have buffet and thali at the restaurant. It's misleading -...