Curry patta — Restaurant in Estepona

What a massive shame. I came here when they first opened and it was exceptionally good - back then. The food was unbelievable - everything was amazing. Sadly though, since then, it´s gone down and down. I´ve been back many times since then hoping that it would be as good as the opening week but nope. The only great thing about the restaurant now is the manager Sam, and in fact he is the only reason that I kept on going back as often as I did. One time the food was so poor that Sam replaced it free of charge - unfortunately, the replacement was just as poor as the original. Last night we ordered a chicken Khadai, a chicken Balti and a kids chicken Korma with rice, Peshwari naan and Parata bread. In fairness, the Korma was lovely as always, but, that´s where the good news ends. The Khadai and the Balti were almost exactly the same dish! My fiance chose the Khadai because they´re (meant to be) stuffed full of rich, fiery ginger flavours. I love Balti (I´m a Brummie). The dishes last night were pretty much identical in taste, consistency and appearance, both almost identical, both poor. The breads, oh my god, the breads - horrendous. The naan was hard, thick and rubbery, it was actually difficult to tear pieces off and when we did, we could bend them and they´d flick back into place like rubber. The parata was the same. The rice was good. We also ordered a Tarka Dhal which tasted decent but had a watery consistency (even when stirred through).

I loved this restaurant when it opened and was really happy when I saw that Sam was running it. We´d met him previously at their sister restaurant (a Thai place just down the road). Sam is fantastic. Friendly, open, engaging and a great host too. Sadly though a restaurant will always (rightly) be judged on its food first. Cleanliness and service too of course (Patta is spotlessly clean and the service always decent, great when Sam is there), but, the food is now poor, blandly samey and highly overpriced for what you get. The consistency was a little gloopy too. It was as though they´d taken a batch of sauce and popped bell peppers into one dish and sliced tomato into the other with no thought of spices, depth or seasoning (or even bothering to at least make them tast different to one another, let alone how they SHOULD have tasted). Unfortunately it looks like they´ve resorted to the old "don´t worry about it, it´s mostly tourists, we´ll never see them again, just give them anything, don´t waste your time trying" mentality which is really sad for me as I LOVE Indian food and Estepona has a lot of curry lovers that live here full time.

They also need to consider that there is another Indian restaurant a few yards behind them (Everest) who´s food is vastly superior and thankfully have retained their extremely high quality and standards, even after having been open for a while.

I won´t go back. Burning fifty odd Euros every time I get a takeaway only to find that it´s still very poor isn´t something that I´m going to carry on doing (Sorry Sam, if you´re reading this you´re too good for the restaurant mate). If the food was as good as Sam, I´d be there every week, I won´t ever go back until/unless they replace the entire chefs brigade which obvously won´t happen of course but I´ll live in hope.

If you like consistently good Indian food, there are FAR better places in Estepona, even Chilli in El Pilar are WAY better and they deliver to Estepona too. So, in conclusion, gutted. This place was fantastic, now it´s poor and has been poor for months and months and trust me, I´ve tried and tried. If you want to eat Indian food that is pretty much guaranteed to be really good,...

July 2024

Having eaten here many times before, today was a huge disappointment. The naan was horrible & completely inedible as it was so soggy. The chicken Dhansak was ok but not up to their usual standard and the onion Bhajis were very dense and not up to their usual fluffy consistency. Perhaps a different chef for the holiday season - who knows.

Thankfully the naan was removed from the bill - the least I’d expect as it was completely inedible.

After today’s experience can only give 3* - a drop from the 5* I gave before.

Had today’s experience been my first, I would not have gone back!

I hate these rollercoasters of quality.

Once again Curry Patta has surpassed expectations. I would rank it in the top 10 curries in the world I’ve had. (See my post for the Indian in Mojácar)

Wonderful exciting food. Great value.

If you like good Indian food I highly recommend.

Si quieres la comida hindú excelente, creo que Curry Patta es el mejor restaurante hindú...

Prácticamente todo mal. Teníamos una reserva a las 21:00 y cuando llegamos al restaurante no tenían ninguna mesa preparada para nosotros y tuvimos que esperar. A la hora de pedir las bebidas, el camarero nos dijo literalmente que pidiésemos rápido porque tenía prisa, lo cual me pareció de mala educación y poco profesional, además de que no hablaba prácticamente español y nos contestaba en inglés. Entiendo que es una zona turística, pero al fin y al cabo estamos en España y deberían poder atenderdernos en español. También pregunté por la carta de alérgenos, de la que los restaurantes deben disponer por ley, pero en lugar de traérmela, el camarero me dijo que lo único que tenía gluten eran los panes, lo cual no era verdad ya que más tarde pregunté por algunos entrantes y también contenían gluten. Tardaron más de una hora (sin exagerar) en cogernos la comanda de la comida porque decían que la cocina estaba muy ocupada. Finalmente, cuando ya pedimos y nos sirvieron la comida (eran ya cerca de las 23:00), primero nos trajeron las carnes en salsa, 10 min después el arroz (por lo que los platos ya se habían enfriado) y unos 20 min después el pan, cuando ya habíamos prácticamente terminado de comer. Entretanto, pedí al camarero un vaso de agua para tomarme una pastilla y, para mi sorpresa, dijo que no podían dármelo y que tenía que pedir una botella de agua. Le contesté que por ley los restaurantes deben proporcionar a los clientes vasos de agua del grifo gratis, pero se excusó diciendo que lo hacen para evitar que alguien pueda intoxicarse con el agua del grifo y denunciarles (una tontería, ya que en el pueblo hay muchas fuentes con agua del grifo, la cual es potable). Por último, en cuanto a la comida, los platos eran bastante pequeños, tan solo tenían unos 5 trozos de carne y mucha salsa, costando unos 10€ cada plato. Incluso los platos de arroz eran bastante escasos. Respecto al sabor, estaban buenos, aunque ninguno picaba en absoluto, a pesar de que la carta decía que algunos eran ligeramente picantes, por lo que no me recordaron a la cocina tradicional india. Aparte de todo esto, cabe destacar que los camareros estaban muy poco pendientes de nuestra mesa y nos costaba que nos atendiesen, y tampoco vinieron en ningún momento a quitarnos los platos sucios o las botellas de bebida vacías. Les tuvimos que pedir nosotros que se los llevasen cuando vinieron a traernos más comida. En definitiva, tanto la atención como la relación calidad-precio dejan mucho que desear. Para mí personalmente es el peor restaurante indio...