Paradise Biryani Pointe — Restaurant in Fridley

Paradise Biryani is a pleasant little surprise, a near hidden gem tucked back in a little lot near Fridley's big Super Target. Sometimes with these smaller family-run restaurants you could be in for a mixed bag of an experience, but Paradise delivers a delicious and authentic Indian dining experience.

I dropped in on a Tuesday afternoon just after the lunch hour and it was quiet, only a few of us in the restaurant with no wait to get seated. As a newcomer, I wasn't sure what the protocol was — but with the lunch buffet going on, you just get up, grab a plate, and load up.

Nearly everything had some level of spiciness to it, so if you're not a fan of spicy food, you probably won't care for half of the food in the buffet...or maybe most of it. But I loved it and enjoyed pretty much everything they had to offer. I'm pretty sure I'll regret eating as much as I did later on, but in the moment of it all, it was pleasant and delightful. Perhaps only one or two of the chicken dishes were a tad on the dry side, but most of them had some sort of sauce to compensate for any dryness in the meat.

The few complaints I have: • Not only should we be seated by the host, but they should also take a moment to offer us something to drink besides water, and also invite us to grab a plate from the buffet — giving us a social cue as to how things work at Paradise Biryani. • No one ever came by to check on me to see if I needed more water. My glass sat empty for too long. If no one's going to walk around to check on drink levels, at least provide a self-service water dispenser that I can go grab water from. • I'm a beer drinker — it'd be a cool novelty to have some beer available (whether local craft beer or imports from India) to wash down the food. Beer washes spicy food down much better than water. • The interior and exterior is starting to show signs of wear and tear, it may be time to clean things up a bit, put a fresh coat of paint on, and other niceties.

But by in large, you should add Paradise Biryani to your list of destinations for good ethnically inspired food. I'm not an Indian food expert, so I have no means of saying where this restaurant lies on the continuum of Indian restaurants. But I really enjoyed the food and will definitely be back when I start feeling the craving for...

I have previously rated this place 5 stars 8 months ago and I ate there, as well as picked up food to take out through Eat24. I would show up, give my name, get the order. But today I ordered to pick up myself through DoorDash and when I went to pick up, giving my name wasn’t enough, I was asked to show my phone with the order. Yet, the lady at the front desk could not tell me what she wanted to see, another customer stepped in and told me to pull my email, while she told me to hand my work connected phone with some highly confidential work data to this complete stranger to browse through ‘to help me with the order’. When I indicated I am not comfortable handing my phone in and I just need instructions or to be shown, she continued to push me to hand my phone to the man. The lady almost gave me my order after seeing the email, but then she wanted to know whether I paid. I paid at the time of placing the order online, that’s how it always works with DoorDash, payment completes before the order is submitted to the restaurant, but she could not know that or verify that in her system, I had to pull my pending credit card transactions on my phone credit card app to show her proof that I paid. This was a public scene in front of other people. I found this lady’s treatment of a direct restaurant customer really rude, if not outright humiliating. She seemed to have a significant role at this place, my guess would be at least the manager. In a similar fashion to my experience, why this place just doesn’t start to grill customers whether they can ‘really pay’ and ‘are making a legitimate order’ when they walk in to dine in? Why not grill them whether they will run off before paying for their dinner when the food is served? I used to bring my friends there, I doubt I will be recommending this...

This restaurant doesn't even deserve "one star".

In the past, the buffet was AMAZING. Not only was their chicken tikka masala of amazing quality, but they served it with other wonderful dishes like chicken tandoor, goat curry, chicken curry, chili chicken, and chicken manchurian that could be mixed with their biryani. They also had papri chaat or samosa chaat which were really good quality in silver bowls with covers on a table in front of their buffet. Additionally, their buffet included two wonderful sweet dishes from the following options: warm gulab jaman, halwa, or seviya. I would find myself eating until I could eat no more.

Jan 5th 2019: The buffet had the following main dish options: chicken curry, chicken tikka masala, chicken tandoor. All three dishes SUCKED. They were SO BAD that my fam just gave up on the buffet and left to eat somewhere else. None of the waiters asked us for any drinks and only served us room temperature water. The sweet dish options were the following: mango chaat, mango kulfi, and something labeled "mango cake". The mango chaat was ok, the mango kulfi SUCKED, and the mango cake really looked like ladoos that tasted AWFUL and you could tell were made by them because of their irregularity in shape. Honestly I was so shocked on how bad the food was that my family was saying that maybe a change in a management may explain the poor quality food we were served.

In summary, until I hear from people and see with my own eyes that this restaurant's buffet options, food quality, and customer service has changed/meets the standards it used to meet, I will be visiting india palace or india house for...