Masala Elaichi Indian Restaurant — Restaurant in Burlington

As a former proponent of GBG down the street, I had previously felt no need to switch to Elaichi. I had tried a few bites of a friend's order from them when they first opened, and felt at the time that GBG was better.

Recently, GBG has gone back to being wildly inconsistent (sometimes the best, most flavorful Indian food you've ever had, sometimes downright inedible). As a result, I wanted to try Elaichi again - glad I did! While all three times the order has been slightly incorrect (duplicate of one item, missing another), the food itself has always been consistent and delicious.

The vegetable samosa is without question the best samosa in town, nowhere else comes close. The Chicken Tikka Masala is really good, but a little one-dimensional in my opinion if you don't get it "spicy" . The butter chicken is basically the same as the Tikka - really good, and very consistent. The Chicken tandoor is a standout item. Basically a half chicken with veg!

In short, Elaichi is pretty consistently 4.5 stars for every item on the menu. Really really good, but not "the best I've ever had". GBG on their absolute best days did take honor, but rolling the dice on if you'll get the most delicious Indian food you've ever had, or food poisoning, is absolutely not a risk worth taking. Why gamble when you can get consistently delicious food from Elaichi instead?

I'll definitely be...

Second update: Taste and quality have improved as well as the take out service. Added a star!

Update: Visited them after a few months to give them another try. Looks like an honest effort has been put to improve. Ambience is cleaner and service is better.

Previous review: Very disappointing. I am surprised at the positive reviews! They run short on staff. When we went there, there was just one lady giving out food to patrons who were picking up, taking orders on the phone, taking temperatures, taking orders of people dining in, serving them and changing the music that was being played (which sometimes got too loud)! The ambience was terrible. The guests seated near our table had ordered a 'sizzler' and when they brought it out, the entire place was filled with smoke and everyone was coughing. The ambience was hot and stuffy. Everyone was profusely sweating, including the server. The paneer tikka was just a lump of charred paneer accompanied by equally charred vegetables. The chutney was watery and tasteless. The sambar had a burnt taste and it seemed like it was prepared in the morning, reheated and served throughout the day.

And all this would have been just fine except for this one point below: The restroom was abysmally dirty and we could only pray the...

Food was excellent and well prepared. Good value for plate volume and flavor. I adore Indian Food and have been cooking it and eating it for decades. Just a helpful hint on the hospitality side. We had an off putting end of the meal experience. We were literally kicked out of the restaurant at 9:00 pm on a Sunday evening by the woman owner "manager". Without any warning the middle aged Indian woman managing the front of the house apparently told our waitress to tell us that that we must leave now!

We we paying customers who spent a good amount of money for about 5 or 6 dishes. Definitely not the way to treat your patrons. I understand cultural differences etc but kicking seated paying customers out right on the bell at 9:00 pm is just plain rude! We were about finished eating but there were several other tables around us that received the same disrespectful treatment. The owners probably don't care and it won't effect their business much. The food itself is good but word to the wise it's not a fine dining establishment. Also we were constantly bombarded by an annoying camera flash of a security camera in the corner of the dining room. I'm not sure what that is all about but definitely annoying as well. I would have given them 5 stars but the sit down dining experience left much...