Taj Indian Restaurant Madrid | Cocina Hindú — Restaurant in Madrid

I am an Indian living overseas and was visiting Madrid. So I did the most touristy thing while trying to find an Indian restaurant to eat at, found the place on Google, looked at the 4.1 rating by over 1.2K people (at the time - Oct 2023). I thought it was decent enough, did the mistake of not looking at the details before deciding to eat in. It might look like I’m exaggerating but everything about this restaurant was abysmal.

Food - The chicken in the Chicken Karai was so underwhelming, like straight out of a supermarket packet. The curry was so sweet despite being apparently moderately spicy. The Paneer Makhani was also the same, so sweet despite being asked for spicy, the paneer was stretchy like rubber, with barely any taste. The aloo paratha was a just a flat bread stuffed with bland potatoes, and it definitely didn’t seem fresh. The garlic naan was the same, like it was baked a long time and served by just reheating.

The service was horrible, the manager was so rude, he definitely needs a course in manners. When asked for a general idea on what is the spice level (because we wanted spicy food but also not something so spicy that would rip out the inner linings of our stomach), he just lectured us on how it is too hard to predict and how it’s too different for everyone. The expression on his face totally changed when we said we didn’t want any alcohol.

TL;DR - Please find another Indian place to eat, this place is a sham! 1 star...

My husband and I wanted to find a restaurant near the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum after leaving the Prado. I wanted to go here because I missed Indian food and they have a menu of the day for €14.50.

We arrived around 2 pm and the restaurant was full but we only had a short wait for a table. This is definitely not a tourist restaurant which is good. The menu of the day includes 2 courses, naan, beverage, dessert, and either coffee or tea.

The selection for the courses differs depending on the day of the week. We were there on a Tuesday and chose the chicken samosa and pakora as our first course. This came with a variety of chutneys, I recognized the tamarind and mint cilantro chutneys but the others were unfamiliar. The chicken samosa was tasty, the pakora was very different from what we have in the US but tasted fine. For our second course, we ordered the chicken curry. This also included rice. We both liked the flavor of the curry. My husband had a beer and I had a glass of red wine. For dessert, you could select an Indian dessert like gulab jamun or kheer or a western-style dessert. We chose the chocolate cake and also had tea. I thought we had ordered chai tea but it was mint flavored which was strange. This was a delicious lunch and a...

NYE experience. We made reservations online and no where mentioned a special NYE menu, we just wanted regular a la carte indian food. When we walked in to our reservation at 8pm, the waiters were setting up and loudly kicked us out, saying they weren't open until 8:30pm. Okay, no problem, we'll wait outside in the cold I guess. Around 8:30pm, other people showed up and were also kicked out. Once inside, the waiter explained that there's a special NYE menu for €40. There's also an option for a la carte but they're adding a 40% surcharge to the prices for NYE. Already a bad taste in my mouth but whatever it's NYE. We choose the NYE menu. We watched them explain this price difference to everyone who came in and it was just so confusing for everyone. The food looked good, but the lamb & chicken curries were flavorless and not even salty. The chicken in my curry was very hard & I didn't eat much of it. There was a sweet curry (maybe pumpkin?) that did stand out and was delicious, it was their special for the night. 1/3 people who are here got food poisoning but the other 2 were fine so who knows if it was them. But I wouldn't return again based on the...