Indian Oven — Restaurant in Amarillo

I was on a small vacation to Albuquerque from Houston and on the way back we stopped at Amarillo where we found India Oven restaurant and had dinner there on December 30th, 2017. We ordered Biryani which took ages to come and the restaurant wasn’t even busy but we waited patiently and just before we were about to leave and find another place to eat, the food showed up. It was shocking to see the newest form of Biryani first time ever in my life as I am crazy about Biryani and eating Biryani all my life everywhere but this was some experiment on Biryani. The Biryani was not colored rice (white and red as it should be) but all yellow (like Pulao) but that wasn’t a big deal, it was stuffed with green peas as much as the rice in it which blew my mind off. I never ate, saw or even heard of such a Biryani anywhere in my life and I asked the owner’s wife about this unique Biryani and she said she is also shocked to hear that as she always knew that Biryani is supposed to look like that and never heard of what I was talking about. I told her that I am eating Biryani for decades and if you just search Biryani in Google images, you will see tons of correct Biryani pictures the ones I am taking about, she argued a little and left but did not offer any solution or made any effort to fix it – don’t know what happened to ‘customer is always right’. I then talked to the owner himself who just said ‘no problem’ several times and left, not sure what does that mean to the issue we were having. We then spend as much time in removing the green peas as much as we waited for the food but there was no other choice as there was nothing close by to eat and we had a lot of road to cover. Upon payment, I was expecting that the owner might give me a small discount for the inconvenience caused or even apologies for the inconvenience but nothing. The taste of rice and chicken was fine (once we removed the green peas) but I didn't like the attitude of the restaurant owners towards us. I am attaching a picture of the real Biryani to clear doubts of other...

I knew I was going to love dining here as soon as I opened the front door. You could cut the smell of curry with a knife. And if you like curry-themed dishes, well, this is heaven.

As I looked around, I saw a very diverse crowd of diners, of which about 50% were either Indian or from nearby. This is always a good sign when dining in ethnic restaurants. If the folks from the featured cuisine are eating there, then you know it passes muster.

I started with a cup of piping hot black tea, which was perfect for the chilly night I visited. I then orders the Madras Vegetables, which as the menu says is “fresh vegetables blended with spices and a touch of curry sauce,” the base of which was coconut milk. A large bowl of steamed rice accompanied my entree. Although I asked for medium heat, I was a little surprised that it hardly registered. It was still delightfully tasty, though, so next time I will turn it up a couple of notches in hopes of getting the full effect.

I also ordered a huge round Roti, which is a vegan flatbread, very thin, and perfect for dipping. Serving sizes were perfect…not so much that I needed to do takeaway, but not so little as to be left still hungry. It was a great value, and as with most Indian restaurants, there are many options for vegetarians and vegans, but also plenty of choices...

This was the worst buffet experience I’ve ever had. They had only a few items: butter chicken, paneer masala, goat curry, chicken wings, tandoori chicken, and a few others. Of all these, only the butter chicken was consistently available. The other dishes were not refilled regularly.

It appeared that they were counting the number of people at each table and only refilled the chicken wings twice—likely allocating just two wings per person. Once the wings ran out, they were never refilled. The tandoori chicken wasn’t refilled at all. I waited for over an hour for the goat curry to be restocked, but it never was.

I mentioned this multiple times to the service lady, but she showed no interest or concern. Her attitude was unacceptable, as if we were eating there for free. This restaurant clearly does not understand how a buffet should operate. Not refilling food items regularly is misleading and unfair to customers.

I also urge the restaurant owner to review the service staff’s behavior and facial expressions—especially the lady who was on duty that day. You can probably see it all on the CCTV footage.

The food itself was good, but this was not a true buffet experience. Not worth...