Namaste Montana — Restaurant in Kalispell

Where to start ? Right - from the reviews before going to the restaurant maybe. Looking at the positive reviews online wanted to give the restaurant a try. It’s a new restaurant (from the looks of it as I am not a local but was traveling during the long weekend) and the only Indian restaurant in the area. Given this they would definitely have an upper hand as lots of folks visit Glacier National Park. Coming to the food and service, the menu is extensive catering to both north and South Indian. We tried both. North Indian snacks - Gol Gappe and Aalo tikki chaat. Let’s talk about gol gappe - presentation was good but taste was bad The mint water was not water but they added water to mint chutney and gave that (which had curd in it btw). The tamarind water was also nothing with tamarind chutney with water added to it and it was stale. Now about aalo tikki chaat - this was ok. Tikki was crispy but the species was lacking but better than gol gappe. Mind you - the server asked the spice level and we told him 7/10 on Indian spice level.

Let’s talk about South Indian now. Wanted to try idli and dosa but they were out of idli and vada. Ordered the big dosa (think it was 16 inch something) and Mysore masala dosa. Both the dosas were dry to the bone as if not even a drop of oil or ghee was added to roast it. It was not crispy also because of this reason . The coconut chutney was sweet and the sambhar was watery with little to no lentils in it. On top of it looks like they added the left over vegetables in sambhar ( I mean who adds boiled potatoes, red and yellow peppers in sambhar:) ). We couldn’t finish the dosas as they were dry. After reading great reviews and then finally tasting the food, I would say we were very very disappointed.

Why 2 stars you ask- it’s all because of service . At least we didn’t encounter any service issues.

But I am pretty confident that this restaurant will end up doing great, simply because it’s the only Indian restaurant in the area but if I were to ask , I won’t go...

It was a bad experience. I have been to many 'Indian' restaurants across the globe and this possibly ranks one of the lowest in terms of service and attitude of the servers and manager. We were given a table quickly, however, no one came to take order for about 20 minutes. Servers kept on moving around, taking orders from the people arriving after us, manager stating "I don't take orders" (of course, I wasn't asking him to take orders, I was only requesting for a server to be assigned). Eventually, someone took the orders. For a party of 2 adults and 2 children, we had ordered one starter (Chilli Paneer) and three veg entrées (Nizami handi, Karahi Paneer and Dal Makhani). Orders arrived in a reasonable time, quantity of each item was good too. However only Nizami Handi and Daal Makhani arrived initially. When I reminded about the starter, server brought the starter and the remaining entrée (essentially starter and entrée at the same time) saying that chef had forgotten about it. There was (far) too much salt in the chilli paneer and karahi paneer tested somewhat sweet (which usually should be the case with some other paneer dishes not with karaahi paneer). Naan wasn't up to the mark either. No one came to check about the food during our stay (usually I would expect it if you are advertising yourself as a 'fine-dining' place). It took another 10 minutes to bring the check after we finished the food (despite signalling twice). While waiting for our check, noticed highly unprofessional conduct by couple of servers: they were making fun of another culture, gesticulating towards a party sitting on...

The food was phenomenal, the place was clean and the staff were awesome! I gave it a perfect rating because I believe the issue I had does not stack up at all against how great everything else was!

To anyone reading further, genuinely try this place because the food was some of the best I've ever had in a restaurant in my life! Do yourself a favor and check this place out, cause it was phenomenal.

At my table, multiple people ordered items such as the Chicken Rogan Josh, Butter Chicken and Curry and I felt there wasn't enough meat to go the whole meal.

Now let me first preface this by saying the Sauce was genuinely the best I've ever had, I give it an easy 10/10 with no complaints. But there was only enough chicken to eat about half the sauce and rice before running out.

Admittedly, they gave us a big serving of rice and the sauce over it was so good I feel bad even complaining, but I was expecting a bit more meat in the meal.

That was the only complaint I could think of genuinely though. The server was incredibly nice and friendly, the place had a delightful aroma as soon as I walked in the door and again I cannot stress enough that the sauce was the best I've ever had.

Despite my complaint about the portion of meat, everything still tasted phenomenal, it was well cooked, perfectly seasoned and I still walked away with a full belly and a wonderful experience.

I wish the absolute best for this place, and I will absolutely be going again. I can easily see it becoming one of the hottest restaurants...