India Garden Restaurant — Restaurant in Bloomington

The food was excellent, but we got the strangest "vibe" from our server, the owner, all throughout our meal.

I'm going to start out by saying that I'm a senior, I'm openly gay (and I've been out for 55 years), and my partner and I ate at this restaurant on 30 July, 2023. I have a personal "trademark" of wearing rainbow suspenders. (It's more a matter of "keeping my pants up" than a statement of gay pride, and rainbow colors match everything I own!)

The food overall is delicious. I was really happy with the papad (crispy wafer chips -- these are incredible!) and my lamb rogan josh. The appetizer which we ordered, chicken pakora, looked like the dregs of a day's cooking instead of six individual pieces of chicken, and the sum total of the appetizer was not enough for a mouthful. This was disappointing.

As I mentioned earlier, all throughout the meal we got the strangest vibe from the owner, who seemed to "sneer" at both my partner and me when we requested a refill of a drink, even though we went out of our way to thank him and be polite to him.

If you visit, be aware that the restaurant is open, but is currently being remodeled.

The attitude of the owner during the course of our meal was really off-putting. Most of the food (save for the appetizer) was really delicious; but because of the attitude of the owner who was serving us, we won't be...

I was deliberating whether to give Amol India one or two stars. In the grand scheme of things, there are worse restaurants, but Amol India really stood out with its poor quality, comparing to restaurants in Bloomington and elsewhere in Indiana.

We went there for dinner, so my review has nothing to do with the lunch buffet quality, which I don't know anything about. The food was really bad, especially baingan bharta (eggplant), one of the dishes we got. I was already suspicious when food arrived within minutes from order. I know that you have to prepare some of the food ahead of time, but I think that the dishes we got were waiting all done in a fridge or freezer.

What pushed me to give one star instead of two was the final look into the kitchen. It was HORRIBLE. I know that there are places that are as bad or worse, but at least they have an idea of concealing their mess from the customer. Amol India apparently thinks that it is good for you to see where your food was prepared when you pay the bill at the register. Looking into that kitchen made me feel sick all the way back home.

Bottom line: go somewhere else. Bloomington has many better restaurants. If you want Indian, I recommend Shanti. Not the best Indian restaurant I have ever been to, but Bloomington does not offer much choice in Indian food. Comparing to the competition,...

2025 update: The restaurant has really gone downhill. The order was wrong, everyone working there was messy and had food on their shirts, looked extremely sleep deprived, the food made me icky. The atmosphere was very weird. I used to work in this building and I know that about 80-90% of the space is now off limits to the guests, which is very very weird to me just how much stuff must be getting stored in the restaurant (maybe people live there or something?). I didn't enjoy my meal and it was pretty $$$. I suggest Taste of India instead.

4 years ago: Half of the dishes were alright, but my vindaloo had a lot of cilantro (coriander) in it which completely ruined the taste of it. I can only taste the bad aldehydes in cilantro and they taste like soap to me. I was hoping for more of a BIR curry base sauce without cilantro.

It was also very weird paying for the food. There was a mystery 3.99 charge on the bill and attempting to use a coupon resulted in haggling. I had no issues with the price or price after the coupon, it was just weird. If you don't like cilantro, the tikka masala sauce seemed to...