Tarana Bar & Restaurant — Restaurant in Mid Sussex

I've found it really difficult scoring my visit to Tarana and have taken a little time to think about it. Firstly, it wasn't a bad experience necessarily but having read the reviews I had high expectations.

Tarana is a surprisingly big restaurant and I think visiting on a fairly quiet Weekday evening didn't show it at its best. It felt a bit empty because of its size and there was A LOT of waiting staff moving around - possibly 2 or 3 staff for every customer. Some of the staff would stand near our table looking a bit bored and it didn't help us to relax and enjoy our time. Because of the emptiness the restaurant felt a bit dark. I can imagine the restaurant is probably a different expirience during a busy weekend. The welcome was... fine? We were waved towards a table and presented with the menus but I wouldn't describe it as a warm welcome.

The food was fine but unremarkable. I had a naga madras from the specials and whilst it had a really nice heat to it the underlying flavours weren't particularly exciting. I had mushroom rice and poppadoms to accompany and the portion size was good. Service was quick and fine. For two curries, two rice, poppadoms, a beer and a non-alcoholic beer the bill was a little over £50 which is fair. I added 10% service charge. The most the waiter spoke to me during the visit was when the topic of adding a tip was brought up which I found quite funny. When we left it felt like a warmer departure than the welcome.

So overall, it was fine. I can't criticise or complain about anything in particular. I think we are going to revisit but this time as a group on a busy weekend and see if this is where Tarana shines - so I look forward to revisiting this review after our second visit. For now, I'm...

This is the first time I have ever written a negative review, but feel it has to be said. Yesterday I ordered a takeaway for collection at 7.00pm. When I arrived I was met with a queue of approximately 30-35 people waiting outside. I parked and joined the queue to discover that people had already been waiting 45 minutes to an hour for their pre-ordered collections. I spoke to the manager, when I finally got inside the restaurant, nearly 1 hour and 30 minutes later, and asked why no one had the courtesy to come outside and provide an explanation. He admitted their was no excuses and promptly went outside to explain. After waiting another 40-45 minutes inside the restaurant, to my horror customers were leaving with their takeaways who had ordered later collection times than me. This is the second time I have experienced this problem. I spoke to the manager about this issue previously and clearly lessons have not been learned. Please remember this was an extremely cold night and many customers were not dressed appropriately to stand outside for such a long time. With social media these days, there is no excuse not to have put something on Facebook etc to alert people to the problem. I have been a regular customer for many years, but I will not be returning again after this shambles. I accept this is a difficult time with Covid, but they are clearly not monitoring their orders, as they cannot keep up...

Went there this evening. Arrived 10 minutes early for our booking and was asked to sit by the bar area for a "moment". Waited about 5 minutes (it was busy and quite noisy) and was shown to our table by our waitress. We were asked quite abruptly, if we wanted poppadoms and how many? Then what drinks we wanted. We got out poppadoms and drinks quite quickly 👍 but nearly 30 minutes had passed and not one of the waiting staff had come to our table to ask if we were ready to order. After my partner went to the bar to complain, a waiter finally came to take our order a couple of minutes later. He did apologise for the delay and said he would make sure our order was done quickly. 15 minutes later we had our food. It was ok, but not as good as it has been in the past. We ordered some more drinks, which also arrived quickly however the diet coke I had tasted funny, like it had detergent in it. I complained and got a replacement. That too tasted like it had detergent in it and I complained again and requested water. I have been to Taranas a few times in the past, and those visits have been really good. I can honestly say, this evening's visit was absolutely awful. I do not think we will be venturing back...