New Hope Spice Lover — Restaurant in New Hope

My fiancé and I stopped in to New Hope Spice Lover late on a Monday night. We were warmly greeted and promptly seated. Our server (we presume he was the owner) suggested the special appetizer - battered pineapple in a spicy, tangy sauce with bell peppers and onions. It was absolutely delicious! We ordered the chicken biryani, chicken tikka masala, and a side of garlic naan. The garlic naan was out of this world! Buttered to perfection and sprinkled with fresh garlic, it was pillowy soft and served as a perfect vehicle to sop up the extra tikka masala sauce. The biryani’s presentation was very cool - it was served in a clay pot with a blanket of naan baked on top. (Similar to how chicken pot pie is presented - a dough-covered dish with the goodies on the inside.) The chicken was juicy and aromatic. The rice was spiced perfectly. We ordered the mild option for both entrees; they were on the upward end of what we’d usually consider mild but still great. The tikka masala sauce was more tomato-forward than cream-forward. I loved this version. So often, tikka masala is on the creamy side that you don’t get to appreciate the depth of flavor and spices. Not the case with this version! All in all, we’d highly recommend New Hope Spice Lover to anyone looking for great Indian food in New Hope and the surrounding area. This place is a treat!

Service: 10/10 Atmosphere:...

Really small space of a restaurant. Tables were tightly placed near each other, but the food was very good. While the guy who takes the order was pleasant enough, there is only that one person to take your order - and he does both online and restaurant orders so it's a bit slow on service when taking and putting in orders. We ordered Chili Paneer for the appetizer which was good, but would have been nice if they could throw the same massla into chicken and sell it as Chili Chicken. For the main course we ordered butter chicken, garlic naan and Goat Biryani. You can't go wrong with the butter chicken and garlic naan, but the goat Biryani wasn't cooked thoroughly and was extremely tough to chew. I did mention to the cook that he needed to cook the meat more to the point it falls off the bone but still juicy. The good thing is that they can adjust the level of spice accordingly. For us he made it just the right amount of spicy. Great food but room for...

The food was insanely hot/spicy! Seriously, even the cold cucumber salad made my mouth feel miserable! Same for the lamb chops. Nowhere on the menu did it state those items were so spicy hot, which really isn’t considerate. The only thing I liked at all, ordered at my table for 9, was the chicken tika masala because the waitress asked how hot one of us wanted it and that person said mild. That wasn’t asked of me and I don’t know why. I would never have expected the dishes I mentioned to be so hot so it would have been nice if they asked! My poor 8 year old grandson ordered them too and couldn’t eat them. Such a waste of money! Good flavorful meat doesn’t need, nor should it be so spicy hot it leaves your mouth feeling burnt! Also, a little atmosphere would be nice too. Place looks so dumpy and feels unclean. Obviously I wouldn’t...