The Monks Indian Fusion — Restaurant in The Colony

Ate at this location twice within 10 days. The first visit was on a Wednesday night with some friends. Food was presented in cute traditional type dishes. The food itself was pretty good considering more often than not, Indian Chinese food comes across a bit sweet... And the dishes here had a nice kick of spiciness. All in all, dinner was good so I returned with my family the following week on a Friday night. The place was packed, which is usually a good sign that the food is worth the wait. As we were waiting to be seated, a disgruntled customer came out of the restaurant with his family while complaining loudly. We ignored him, but now I wish we hadn't. We ordered Chandni Kaliyan as our appetizer and it literally tasted like white colored chicken tikka masala ... Nothing like the way it tasted during my first visit. The Chili Garlic Chicken curry was spicy and tasty, but the rice that we upgraded to fried rice looked and tasted nothing like the fried rice I had at my previous visit. And the Wok-Tossed Hakks noodles were nothing to write home about, but there was clearly a vegetable tossed in there that had spoiled and gave the dish a weird taste and smell.

Aside from the food, the other major turn off was during our bill payment. We paid via credit card and when it came time to select the tip options, the staff member requested cash instead. We don't carry cash so we asked why was cash preferred, to which we were told that if you tip via credit card, the restaurant keeps the money and does not distribute to the staff. She requested we Zelle her the tip separately because we didn't have cash.

Long story short:

The food is inconsistent and it's very likely you may order the same dish on two different days and receive completely different things. Staff doesn't receive the tips paid via credit card because the restaurant keeps all electronic payments.

This whole experience was highly unprofessional and left a bad taste (literally & figuratively). I will not be returning to Monks...

We on a whim prompted by my cousin just headed away from Frisco, to visit Monks on a Sunday evening.

First impressions itself were promising, with smiling staff at the entry, some inviting sweets on display and in quick few 5 mins got our table.

We had for round one Apps: Masala corn, Dynamite paneer and Dynamite Gobhi. The corn was crispy and had a good masala and lime flavor, truly tasty. The dynamite duo had a unique flavor (kind of east Indian flavor) and had a slight sauce coating and crispy bite. We also ordered the Tandoori paneer Momos, but were not top notch, as we felt the covering was too rubbery. The veg hot n sour soup was an exact replica of flavor and consistentcy from back home.

Following this we had Round 2- Main course: we had burnt garlic fried rice, Bandi Masala fried rice and masala veg garlic noodles with egg.

The clear winner was the Bandi Masala Fried rice, that had a spicy undertone, with a mix of veggies and fresh cut onions, giving a burst of flavors.

Burnt garlic friend rice paired with the spicy sauce brought back memories of eating out in Streetside in India.

Masala noodles were the only meh item, so would pass on it.

Round 3 - Desserts: herez where we tried the Mango Tiramisu and Apricot Delight. Mango Tiramisu was a unique twist with a heavy dollop of mango puree and a cake base, very refreshing flavor. Apricot Delight was equally good.

The service was provided by a sweet girl called "Swecha" who was a bundle of energy and always serving with a smile, totally making the experience wonderful.

Definitely an opulent ambience to match the food, falvors and service. Great for big groups and also...

We read such great reviews about this place that we planned an entire evening around it since its a little far from our place. We made reservation about an hour before arriving which was promptly confirmed by the restaurant. On arrival at the restaurant, the girl at the reception informed us that our reservation was confirmed but they had no table for us. I guess they dont understand the concept of RESERVATION! She further informed us that “PEOPLE ARE NOT LEAVING” hence they are unable to honour our reservation and if we could wait for 15-20mins they would get us a table (for 2). We thought probably its a great place so people were sitting a while longer and having a good time so we decided to wait. We got a table after 45minutes of waiting because the empty table were not getting cleaned immediatly and all the seating staff were confused as to which party should be seated on which table. There was total chaos and no management! When we were about to sit we had to ask the cleaning staff to wipe of food from the booth as he had only superficially cleaned the booth! No one came to take our order for 15mins after being seated and we had to ask for water twice which normally gets served immediatly!

We waited another 40minutes for our food to be served which was quite average! Thier idea of indian fusion is to add loads of garam masala and chillies in the food which will burn ur insides!

Our evening was ruined as we were at the restaurant forever! And The Reason PEOPLE WERE NOT LEAVING WAS BECAUSE THEY WERE WAITING FOREVER TO PLACE THE ORDER AND RESTAURANT WAS NOT SERVING THEM FOOD IN A...