Taj Mahal Indian Cuisine — Restaurant in Oaxaca

Stay away!!!

Being fans of Indian food, and looking for a change from mexican flavours, we looked up the small number of indian restaurants in Oaxaca, and decided to try a second one situated in Centro. First off, the rice was plain and tasteless ordinary rice ( not the standard aromatic and tasty basmati kind). One of the 3 different chicken curries tasted off, and the buffet food temperature appeared to be on the low side of safety. I got excited when I spotted a spinach dish, but it lacked the all important paneer, and was also rather tasteless and lacking the all important fresh spices that are custom in indian cuisine. The lack of spice scent in entering the restaurant should have been a clue to what a plain meal was to come, but hunger has a way of bypassing the brain's normal process sometimes... We looked forward to at least some good naan, one of the best bread product one can savour, but unlike the praised product that was raved about in another review, what we got was 2 versions ( garlic, and plain) of a stiff, tasteless form of a hard pita like thing. After tasting it, asked if the restaurant had the all important tandoor oven, necessary for making naan, and was told in the affirmative. One way to describe the naan would be try your hands at making some yourself, and using a pan on a stove will give you the type of amateur result we got served at 20 pesos each. Another dish that was awful, was mixed vegetable curry. The amount of salt in it would be borderline dangerous for anybody with a heart condition. Wasting money on bad food is a big disappointment. The restaurant owner looked surprised by how quick we requested the check, while leaving plates full of un-eated food. That would have been a perfect opportunity to ask how was everything, but he didn't see the need to somehow. My thought on leaving the Taj Majal was: if someone tried indian food here for the first time, they would be unlikely to ever trust anybody on how good it taste! Sadly, there appears to be another restaurant of a very similar name in the same city, and they risk being affected by negative...

Really bad experience! First time I have ever gotten wings (with bone and soggy skin) as a base for butter chicken. What I was served tasted nothing like any butter chicken I have had before (not in a good way) . I ordered jasmin rice but got normal soggy rice instead. The "garlic naan" was thick, dry and flavorless. The "mango lassi" was watery and tasteless. The bathroom was filthy. Service was not good either- the woman who served me was obviously in a hurry to get rid off the only 3 customers there, rushing to get us the bills before we even asked. They did not tell me that they only accepted cash until I was ready to pay. I was MXN$20 short from a MXN$340 total (as I intended to pay with card, since in ny experience visiting Oaxaca often for the past 4 years, pretty much all businesses accept cards here, even some street vendors!). Another customer helped me out by paying it as the woman was not willing to find a solution, even after seeing that I left most of the food untouched as it was so bad. With so many amazing culinary options in Oaxaca, please try something else and save yourself some...

We came in right as they were finished cleaning, and the owner greeted us with a smile and made us feel incredibly welcome. My wife and I are from Chicago, but are vacationing in Oaxaca and I speak spansih so i greeted him in spanish, but we quickly realized that we shared multiple common languages of english and spanish. After we ordered, we had a great conversation about our cultural experiences from our times in different countries, and learned that he speaks 5 languages! When our food came, he kindly let us eat and checked on us to make sure we were ok.

The food was fantastic! The vegan options for my wife were delicious, and my butter chicken was ridiculously good. The mango lasi, chicken shwarma, and simosas i had were also delicious, but the butter chicken was the star of the show for me. I'm sitting in the dinning room right now and can say that I'll without a doubt come back. Some of the bast indian food I've ever had, which was a great unexpcted suprise on my vacation to Oaxaca, Mexico! My only regret is that i was so full i could...