Mowgli Street Food Chelmsford — Restaurant in Chelmsford

We visited Mowgli Chelmsford after reading about it online as there's not a great choice of authentic Indian food apart from one of two in the area. We were quite excited by this recently opened chain, however we left quite disappointed.

Let's start with the good bits:-

1. The decor & the theme is quite good as it creates a buzzing atmosphere. The swings are a great touch for people wanting to create memories & insta reels etc. We didn't get to sit on it as it was quite a busy Sat evening but we could see others loving it. The lighting adds to the charm.
2. The waiting staff are great, friendly, explained the menu & generally attentive as they came a few times to check in on us even though it was extremely busy.
3. Concept & presentation of the food is good. The food is presented in tiffin boxes which adds to the experience.

Now, the Not so Good bits:

1. The lady at the front desk:- when you walk in through a restaurant the person you meet at the door to get seated is the face of the restaurant. Maybe I'm old fashioned, but we were greeted by "You ok there Mate" which was a no no for me. Now it's a very subjective matter & others might not take an issue with it. Although it was very busy, she sounded rushed because she was managing seating etc. That put me off.
2. Menu choice is limited & even moreso if you're vegetarian.
3. It's not an authentic Indian tasting menu. It's more suited to people who like authentic British Indian food as it's more on the less spicy side. I wouldn't call it bland, however it did border on the sweeter side of taste. We ordered the below:- -Bhel Puri - Good 4/5 -Yoghurt chat - Ok 3/5 -Holy Chow- Not so Good 2/5 - we didn't understand this dish - although unique with a kind of potato & dal subzi with thick bread slices. The very thick bread slices put me off as it was difficult to eat while breaking the bread. I'd have preferred it to be substituted with "pav" which is the traditional Indian type of bread so that it doesn't get soggy. Perhaps the founder considers this as an alternative. -Ruby wrap - 2/5 . Too sweet and tangy for our liking. It had too much tamarind sauce IMO which conflicted with the salted paneer cubes. The wholemeal roti was a hit and miss. -Mowgli Puri & Roti bread -4/5. The Ghee used (the ones you get more locally in green tins, brand which I won't mention) isn't quite 'desi ghee' as it has a sweetish & off putting taste/ aroma. This won't be an issue for the majority of the clientele base as they wouldn't notice it. However for an Indian who is pedantic about these things I'd recommend using the likes of Amul or alike if you know what I mean! :) Mango lassi - 3/5. Tasted very different to your usual lassi with a distinctive different taste. Pinot Grigio - 4/5.

Overall I'd say it's an OK restaurant as it's definitely a novelty with plenty to offer from an experience point of view. However I feel they definitely need to up their game from a menu choice & taste perspective.

We spent £100 for 2 adults + 2 children with the above menu choices & left wanting for more after having spent so much money.

I'd prefer if you went in bold & went "authentic Indian" to add to the authentic Indian concept to make the...

I have to share my disappointment given how eagerly I was waiting for the restaurant to open in Chelmsford. An Indian street food restaurant-hell yes! To state the positives, I loved the ambience, swing seats, lights and the simplicity of the menu. It was easy for me to book a table for two online and also make a change on the phone. However, a restaurant is as good as its food is and sadly, Mowgli was a let down. In possibly an attempt to make the food palatable to people used to less spice, they added sugar of honey to every dish, and failed to imbibe any authentic Indian flavour. We ordered two starters: yoghurt chat bombs (too sweet) and Mowgli sticky chicken (which was strangely served at the end)- couldn’t eat it beyond the first bite as all I could taste was a lot of ginger, sugar/honey and too much soy sauce, leaving a bitter aftertaste. The roti bread (name echoes the redundancy of chai tea!) was soft enough, so no complaints; but I would have preferred a selection of other Indian bread- there was only puri, which they said was deep fried and I didn’t want that. The lamb keema was mediocre, and the house chicken curry failed to capture the essence of a ‘Keralan (no such word!)’ coconut milk-based recipe. The rice was fine. We had to remind our waiter to take our order after 15 minutes, but he was very friendly. As someone who loves cooking and makes reasonably good Indian food, I would suggest the chefs taste what they cook before serving and not try to drown the essence of spice by sweetening everything. Sorry to make a comparison, but another street food restaurant such as Dishoom retains the authenticity of Indian food and still has long queues of people or all ethnicities. We also had to ask for cutlery to eat with and to serve the food with and was amused to see old ghee tins to hold the cutlery- I hope reuse-recycle was the only reason for it. Also, chicken tikka masala is very much a dish in India contrary to what is claimed on the menu (‘chicken tikka masala does not exist in India’)- Chef Sanjot Keer has an awesome recipe on YouTube, for some inspiration. Apologies for expressing my disappointment. My expectations were...

Im Punjabi (north indian parents from Kenya and Punjab) i came to mowgli after going to countless bad indian restaurants, AKA bengali restaurants.. i was hoping to actually taste real indian food since moving to north essex over 9 years ago from east london.. i was soo let down! we dont EVER have pomegranates or nuts in our food man, come on! is this a south indian restaurant? the food was soo sweet when it didnt need to be, there was no fresh cut onions, tomatoes, radish, nothing.. (we normally have side salad dishes to balance or add to food flavour) the cocktails just had rose syrup or garam masala init... the espresso martini worked with the garam masala and the lychee martini worked with the rose syrup to be fair, prob be worth adding a pinch of turmeric to it to the espresso to give it the xmas ting.. The service.... we had to remind the staff more then once that we were ready to order drinks, 30 mins after being seated we finally got to order drinks and 2 were wrong and needed to be sent back, they just left them on our table and took them off our bill, we got free deserts because the table we were promised was given to someone else. Atmosphere was ok, they had swing seats but the kids couldnt go on them!

Bottomline the food was way toooooo sweet, we dont have pomegranates in our food bro! iv never even seen nuts in indian mains food only in desserts!! other then south indian food (Waaaaay south) they have this stuff in there foods..

Mowgli is blatantly an indian take on a money chain restaurant like the turkish have "kervan kitchen" imitating "kervan servrasi", the later are the authentic establishment the other are a copy cat capitalising on the population being dumb.. go to the proper places to taste the real food people.. as an actual real north indian i was real disappointed and will never go back to any Mowgli! if you people are ever in east london go to "kanchans" its in gants hill outside of east london but you wont regret it, live music and real indian food not the negali generic stuff you see regurgitated...