Dosa Grill — Restaurant in Town of De Witt

A very peculiar and disappointing experience. Me and a friend met here for dinner, as soon as we walked in the staff just stared at us as if we should not have been there, no hellos or how are you or anything. After a few minutes someone came over to seat us. We were coldly seated and given some sort of thin crisp thing with three different sauces, kind of reminded me of chips and salsa at a Mexican restaurant. The crisp thing, unfortunately I do not know what this is called, had pretty much no flavor so it was the sauces that carried that. They were typical sauces you get at an Indian restaurant, I was a bit confused because I never had been served like this at an Indian restaurant but that's fine, something new. We were looking at their appetizers and noticed that they had spring rolls on their menu, we were very intrigued since we have never seen this at an Indian restaurant so we decided to try them. Well that was our first mistake. They tasted like frozen spring rolls You buy from any grocery store, and not the good ones. I have no idea what the sauce was they served it with but it tasted like apple pie filling. Literally. Very odd. For my entree I went to my usual favorite, chicken tikka masala which was horrible. It was just chicken and sauce, no peppers and hardly any flavor. It literally tastes like they went to the grocery store and bought a jar of tikka masala sauce, threw it on top and called it a day. It was the worst chicken tikka masala I have ever had at a restaurant, And honestly it feels like they didn't even try. We also ordered garlic naan which was actually pretty good! It was the best thing we had there the entire night! So overall the food was pretty bad, but amazingly the service was even worse. The entire visit was very awkward and there was a very negative energy looming in the place. It was an all male staff, which I am completely fine with, but they definitely had The vibes of women are second-class citizens. There was zero hospitality, and everyone we interacted with was borderline rude. When we went to pay I asked if cash was okay, the man rolled his eyes and threw his credit card reader on the table and said yeah, walked away and never returned. We ended up leaving The money on the table since we had no idea what to do. When we went to leave we stood up, I was in the path of a server who was several feet away from me but caught up to me quickly. Seeing that I was getting ready to leave and making sure I did not leave anything in the booth I took a minute. He stopped and stared at me with an annoyed glare, huffed and puffed and then walked past me. There was plenty of room for him to walk around me but it was as if he wanted to make it a point that I should have moved out of his way when I saw him walking in the direction where I was.. The whole experience was extremely uncomfortable and disappointing. I honestly felt as a woman I went back about 60 years. I highly recommend to not go to this place, especially if you are a woman. Sahota Palace is about 15 minutes from this place, I would highly suggest going...

It's about time I leave a review for Dosa.. I have been going here for almost two years and have been a couple dozen times. In the past year, I've moved out of Syracuse to south of the finger lakes, or I would have been more, as it's my first or second favorite restaurant in all of the greater Syracuse area, and I have tried many across many types of cuisine. My parents live in Marcellus, and my partner sometimes has business we come back into town for, and I find a way to get Dosa on my schedule every single time I'm here.

I've eaten every entree on the vegetarian menu, most multiple times, and, as a fan of Indian food who has eaten it in DC, NYC, LA, Denver, Boston, and more, I can confidently say it is some of the best Indian food I have ever eaten. Personal favorites are the Chili Paneer and Aloo Gobi. Besides standard south Indian fare found in restaurants across the US, they have street specialties like Dosa, for which the restaurant is named, and Uttapam, both of which I highly recommend. If more common pakora and Samosas are your thing, their veggie samosas are also the best I have ever had.

The service is also always wonderful. I always feel well checked on, and the staff makes sure I have enough rice and water, and that I'm enjoying the food. They ask if I want extra rice to take with my boxed leftovers. The primary manager and most of the regular staff recognize me by now, and say hello and how are you when I come in. The manager every so often offers us and others complimentary food, and I've received complimentary tea, dosa, and dessert. He does this because he is excited to share what he enjoys with appreciative folks who want to try something new. They some times get busy and slow down, and especially during the buffet it can get hard to be seated immediately, plus they handle a steady stream of take out orders all day every day, but that should say more about the quality of the food than anything else.

Don't listen to the Karens whose reviews show they don't know what Roti is (and couldn't be bothered to ask or look it up). If you're at all familiar with Indian food, you'll be very happy with the extensive menu and authentic experience. There are regularly as many Indian people eating here as others, and the restaurant is adjacent to an Indian bakery and grocery store. When you travel, you should eat where the locals eat, and the same applies to the cuisine of other cultures within the US.

I can't help but be confused by some of the negative reviews with how much I love this restaurant, and I have to say that they can come off as mildly xenophobic, which I hope comes from ignorance more than anything else. If you're expecting the sort of fake smile over the top forced happiness of a server you might have at the Olive Garden or Applebee's, you won't get that here. Be kind, and you shall receive...

First off, take note that most of these reviews are paid for/written by a bot - no restaurant gets this many a day, and they are all positive from the past year - We didn’t realize that until after our visit unfortunately. I came in last week for the first time with my husband after working a tiring 10 hour day. We are not from the state and craved some good Indian food. I was about to order the Shrimp Tikka Masala until I saw lobster & crab options for only a few dollars more - The price should’ve been a red flag but I was naively excited. I asked the server ahead of time if the crabmeat would be real or imitation. He seemed offended & confused by my question, so I quickly explained that some restaurants do use imitation (ex. Every California Sushi roll ever), which is fine, but I would just order something else if so. He assured me that it was real crabmeat. I was expecting a small pile of lump crab like you would typically see in a pasta dish & was willing to sacrifice quantity for quality, since I love crab. When my food arrived, it was so packed with “crab meat” that it should have cost over $100. I cut into a thick, bright red cylinder and immediately knew it was imitation. My husband & I have eaten a lot of crab meat in our lives and it’s not very hard to know the difference. When the server came back, we asked him again if he was sure it was real crab, because it seems like imitation - It had no flavor and was solid, not stringy or flaky like real crab. He spend the next few minutes trying to convince me that it was real, until another server came over and started doing the same thing. I felt so awkward, like I was causing a scene, and they didn’t offer to ask the chef or replace the dish, so I ended up just eating around it. They went so overboard explaining that they only use fresh ingredients, not even frozen, that it was very clear they would rather keep the lie going than just admit it. It continued each time they refilled our water, which was crazy. I gave 3 stars because the tikka masala sauce was still actually good, as was the garlic naan, rice pudding and soup. The bathroom was filthy though. They saw that I didn’t eat any of the “crabmeat”, that I didn’t want to wrap up anything to take home, but they didn’t offer a refund or any kind of consolation. The whole experience left me feeling really weird & uncomfortable, and we’re still thinking about it days later. It’s sad because we don’t like to complain at restaurants and we would have been really understanding if they told us the truth, but they doubled down and gaslit us. We’ve both worked in restaurants before. We wouldn’t have done that to customers - and for what? 4 extra dollars? So strange and unprofessional. I wonder what else they’re not...