Jai's Contemporary Fusion Cuisine — Restaurant in Saint Martin

This is not your traditional Indian restaurant. It’s an an Indian fusion with a modern take on traditional Indian dishes and Indian flare added to non Indian dishes. We had the Buffalo cauliflower, tandoori chicken sliders, duck breast, braised ribs; and lobster tail.

The Buffalo cauliflower was on the spicy side, but it wasn’t spicy to be spicy, it was spicy with flavor. Our son who hates spicy food was asking for more of the cauliflower after it was done. The flavors of the Tandoori chicken sliders complimented each other very well.

Our son, the duck connoisseur, had the duck beast - now says this duck is his favorite duck, period. It was perfectly tender with a crispy skin and the black garlic oil really brings out the flavor of the duck.

My wife was skeptical of the braised ribs, but she ended up loving them. The ribs are the large St. Louis style pork ribs. You could pull the meat off the bone with just the fork and flavors were in the meat itself not just the sauce.

I had the lobster. It was tender enough to be cut with just the fork, but I used my knife because I was wanted to make sure every bite had the sauce, corn nibs, and fried fenugreek.

We had a bottle of the Chateau du Beaune with our dinner and it complimented every dish In a different way. If you prefer non-alcoholic drinks their Indian lemonade is a nice spin on traditional lemonade. It had hints of Indian spices added to it, but make sure to ask for a straw to stir the spices in.

For dessert, we had the Kulfi of the day, mango kulfi with mini gulab jamun. And we had the Sizzler. The kulfi and mini gulab jamun were great with each other. If you’re a fan of lava cake you’ll enjoy their sizzler. It’s a brownie with a consistency and texture very similar to a lava cake. The syrup poured over it complimented the chocolate very well.

The service was good. Our server was very knowledgeable about the food and was able to perfectly describe every dish we asked about.

We’ll...

Went there in Aug 2023. In fact, we went to the Island mainly to come and eat at this restaurant. Looks like some of the previous items I had before are less Indian (may be modified to suit the tourists' palates more ?). The Lamb Samosas and baclava are still amazing. Our new discovery this time was the Kulfi. We had the Cheesecake Kulfi, and that by itself justified the trip from the US. (Dec 2021)Went there for Lunch. Had the lamb samosas - different for any other samosa I have ever had. We had the chicken burger and the salmon. The chicken burger was amazing and the salmon was also very good. We ordered the baclava desert to share. It was amazing. We ordered another. It is just mind-blowingly good ! And it's is not like the traditional baklava's. The lunch (and especially the baclava) was so good that we decided to go again. This time for dinner. We had the Buffalo Cauliflower. It was astonishingly good. Jai is a Genius !. The lime in the citrus raita hits you first, then you taste a continuum of flavors that took me from a lime plantation to some Texan Tabasco farm, then flung into a deg (large cauldron) of spices in Delhi and deep fried. For entrees we had the roasted pumpkin and duck breast, both very good. Then for desert we had the baclava (or course) and the Sizzler. That was another sensation. The brownie tastes like an Indian sweet I had when growing up (nan-khatai). But this was a surprisingly different version of it, wrapped in chocolate flavours, and the texture of the brownie was like no other brownie I have ever had. Very light and almost crumbly. Another...

Had the opportunity to check out Jais cuisine on a trip to Sxm recently. I went in on Wednesday for a 8:45 dinner. I had tamarind margaritas, which was an interesting concept. I’ve tried them in NYC before but jais take on it was excellent- very much so like a tamarind candy but not too sweet which is key in a decent cocktail.

Then we proceeded to order just about everything on the menu. Everything was so good- but a couple of dishes stood out- their take on a poutine - loaded fries with a peanut sauce and chicken. This is a Sxm staple that I don’t think many tourists know about but it’s elevated here at Jais. The beet salad was refreshing and so delicious. The short rib was incredible and the sliders were perfect as well, the other highlight was the gnocchi which is coated in an Indian butter sauce- like butter chicken. We asked chef Jai to put shrimp on ours and it was phenomenal. Also there was a sous vide pork chop that was so delicious.

The service at the table was top and we sat next to the open kitchen and got to see him and his team work. Everything was really clean and fresh.

Will definitely be back at jais soon. Might not order as much as I did as we basically rolled out of there, but honestly, no promises- am likely to order the same amount.

Nice job y’all, definitely the culinary highlight...