Mughlai Fine Indian Cuisine — Restaurant in Dallas

Summary: Non-veg food is really good, Sweets are mouth watering, Veg needs improvement, Service is awesome.

Details: We had the honor of visiting the Sunday lunch buffet at Mughlai Restaurant to celebrate our friend's birthday. This was our second visit to this place for a real north Indian Punjabi style food. The first being a dinner about a year ago.

On both occasions and that too, a year apart, the food quality has been maintained and this is what i consider a very good sign for a really good restaurant.

Even though i really liked the food here, i have rated it as 4 out of 5 simply for the vegetarian's sabzi's taste. I feel they need a bit of improvement.

All other dishes were really good. You talk about Tandoori chicken in snacks or Butter chicken (gravy), you will end end up licking your fingers.

They probably have less number of items to choose in their Buffet, as compared to other restaurants, but their food taste stands apart. It is always better to have less but good options than plenty and below par quality.

The Dahi Vada (as they call Dahi Bhalla in Punjabi), was something that reminded me of Delhi. The way it is made is, you add Deep friend moong dal vada floating in salty curd to a bowl, top it up with sweet Tamarind chutney and Green Coriander sauce. The real test of bhalla (vada) quality is their softness and these were melting in my mouth fast enough to even blink.

Tandoori chicken had two flavors, bone-less and with bone. Both were made with precision. The third chicken delicacy was Butter Chicken and was equally good in taste providing enough calories and butter to make one get into deep sleep for hours!

Chicken Biryani was fourth item on menu that had chicken in it. This is a sign that they somehow love chicken or they get real slick-deals on chicken stock! I felt that the rice grain quality needs to be better with Biryani. Also, the texture was not as good as you would find in any other South Indian restaurant.

In the veg section, I tried Balti Dal, Mushroom sabzi and mix veg. Balti dal was good but other two options needs better cooking skills. The mix veg had a bit bit of extra water which spoils the plate. It should ideally be a bit dry.

The bread section had one and only one option i.e. Naan. My wife prefers crispy and hot Naan. This was not the case here. To add to the glory of their dishes, they should improve on serving the hot naan right on table.

Coming to the desserts, we had Gulab Jamun and Jalebi. The crisp Jalebi made our day with Gulab Jamun fulfilling my son's taste buds. Both were good and had the softness and crunchiness that define their texture.

The restaurant service is good with servers re-filing, clearing plates, trying to make your visit memorable and the owner himself visiting each table to address concerns, if any.

My friend (who hosted the birthday) has been a regular customer here since this restaurant opened. He even has his picture in Dallas news paper article, having his team lunch, posted proudly on the, entrance.

No doubt, the restaurant is managed pretty well and has maintained its quality of food and service.

I would recommend this place for a real north Indian meal. They do have a bar and bar stools to have drinks too. Ambiance is good with dim lighting. They have a separate spacious room for party day's too.

Will I...

We arrived at the restaurant at 6:45 pm with our party of 16 (including 7 children), and were seated by the hostess. Our waiter arrived about 10 minutes later (a young Indian college student), and told us he would be back in "1 minute,” with a maximum of 3 minutes. So after about 5 minutes, he comes back for our drink & appetizer orders, but we didn’t have any menus. They didn’t have any menus, so we had to wait 15 minutes to get our menus, which was around 7:30, when we got them. We told him we would have four separate checks, which he didn’t like for some reason. So after we got our drinks and apps, we placed our order, which was around 7:45 pm. While we were waiting for our food, a few members of party were enjoying their drinks, which any normal paying customer does, while waiting for their food. While waiting, our kids were getting tired, and so we took a couple of them outside to run around, that way they wouldn’t disturb other patrons. So after waiting and enjoying a few drinks, we finally got our food at 9 pm. I forgot to mention we are vegetarian, and my wife had ordered “veggie biryani,” which of course had to have to some chicken in it. As soon as my wife found out, she alerted the waiter, who was unapologetic and doubted her. He stormed off with the food, and never came back with it. While the food was a 3/5, the service was awful. After finishing our food, the waiter comes back and asks how everything is, and we told him about our problems, and all he said was “I just work here.” On top of that, my wife was talking to him in “English,” and he tells her to stop talking in English and talk in Gujarati, his native language. We asked for the owner/manager, and he was working the bar, so we talked to him about the problems, and he was also unapologetic and blamed our kids for all the “problems” we had. He said, we kept taking our kids outside and ordering more drinks, that is why our food was delayed. They even had the courage to add an 18% gratuity to everyone’s checks. We had four separate checks, with four separate families paying, so I don’t understand how they can automatically add gratuitity to our checks. There is more to the story, but I don’t want to bore anyone. Bottom line, don’t take your kids with you, and don’t order drinks while waiting...

Drove by Mughlai Tuesday evening looking for food after catching a 5 pm movie at Valley View. Wife is not a big fan of Indian food, but I'd had a good experience here at their lunch buffet, so persuaded her to give it a try. Their were few tables occupied; our hostess thoughtfully seated us away from a large Indian family with small children.

The atmosphere was nice and quiet enough to converse easily. Our tall, rather glamorous African American waitress was nice and very friendly; but perhaps a bit distracted. First, she asked to take our order almost immediately after we were seated before we'd had a chance to peruse the menu, and later after we had finished our appetizers, she asked if we wanted to order dessert--apparently losing track of the status of the main course we'd ordered. There were long periods of time before we could get her attention at least a couple of times during our meal, despite the fact that the place was sparsely occupied. Fortunately the lady who re-filled our water glasses was readily available to pack our leftovers and bring our check when we were ready to leave and could not flag down our waitress.

Sorry to go off on that because the service was certainly very friendly and entirely adequate, and the food was delicious. We particularly enjoyed the tandoori sampler-- a very large portion of tandoori shrimp, salmon, chicken and lamb sausage, served over grilled onions on a sizzling hot platter (sort of fajita style). It was delicious and way more than the two of us could eat, after each having a bowl of soup and sharing a Paneer salad with a yogurt dressing (also delicious). We did not have any alcohol and our entire tab was only about $50 including tax and tip. We'll return for sure for a repeat of that tandoori platter, and hopefully I can persuade my wife to try some other items off the...