Saffron — Restaurant in Lagos

I do not often award five stars to a restaurant but this Indian in Portugal convinced me from start to finish.

You might ask: „Why eat Indian food while you are vacationing in southwest Europe with its great variety of pescatarian and meaty cuisine?“ Well, turns out that the algarve is to pensioners from the UK like Florida is for US old folks. This being said, you won’t be surprised to find a similar restaurant ecosystem as in the rolling hills of west-sussex.

The ‚Saffron‘ has been a Praia da Luz institution for over 25 years. A reign this long cannot last without delivering at an outstanding quality. You will notice this already when calling in (if you are ordering take away). The patient phone operator helps you through the extensive menu of over 250 options, like a T-Mobile call-center agent setting up your new contract.

If you are now thinking „this sounds like any typical cheap Indian take-away“ you are wrong! Dishes are prepared fresh from the start so don’t Even consider a quick pickup! Being German I arrived right on time (5 min early) and immediately was offered a refreshing beer to ease the waiting period.

As the bag of dishes arrived, a warm, welcoming smell of buttered naan and new-world spices smothered me. Once home, I was pleasantly surprised to find a complementary set of pappadam and dip alongside my order. The dishes (chicken as well as vegetarian) were all perfectly balanced and rich in flavor while not too spicy. The portions were more than enough and at a fair price.

Saffron is playing in the league of the Dishooms of this world (for all the Londoners out there) and I can highly recommend this restaurant in terms of service, quality and price.

5 stars...

A friend and I came by this place for Friday lunch, craving variety outside of Portugese seafood. We arrived 15 minutes before they closed their lunch service, and they were kind enough to let us sit until we were done eating.

The food was good and came out fast! Chicken tikka, 9.50 Euros. This was some tender, juicy, well seasoned white chicken meat. They provided tikka sauce on the side. My friend got this one hot spicy, and it was a good burn. Prawn korma, 12.50 Euros. This was much creamier and sweeter than I've had in the past, which I liked! It felt like they used a healthy dose of coconut cream. The shrimps were good. Saag paneer, 7.50 Euros. This was quite mild in flavor, which was fine. I just wish they had seared the paneer cubes a bit longer before they tossed in the saag. Non-seared paneer in a blander saag made this dish unmemorable. Garlic naan, 3 Euros. Delicious, like garlic bread. Saffron rice, 3 Euros. Can't go wrong.

I got the korma and saag medium spicy, which tasted more like a mild to me. I didn't really notice the heat. If you like spicy, go with hot spicy.

No tap water due to poor filtration, so we bought a large bottle of water for 3...

The food is very good, the service is good, and the prices are reasonable. However, something sketchy may be going on here. We ordered an Indian beer (Cobra), and the waiter brought it, imitating opening the bottle in front of us. He poured some beer into the glass and left. When I went to pour more, I noticed TWO still-alive flies inside the bottle.

I'm certain the flies didn't get into the bottle while on our table. There were no flies around, and the bottle was always close to me. The only conclusion I can make is that they are refilling the bottles and pretending to open them at the table. The flies must have been in the bottle when they refilled it. We sat outside where it was windy with no flies around, but saw a lot of flies inside near the toilets.

I informed the waiter, and they gave us another beer (not Indian, by my request) on the house. They also offered more drinks on the house multiple times, though we declined. While they tried to offer extra free services to make the situation better, if they are indeed refilling the bottles, they should not be doing it.

If anyone has another explanation,...