This place had wonderful and savory Indian dishes! Both the mango lassi and the mango lemonade had very high quality mango and an incredible taste. The dishes that we had were the tikka masala with chicken and the Mirch masala with lamb and the tandoori chicken. All of the sauces were to die for and the naan was also very good. So far this has been the best place for Indian food in Austin! Also the little girl who took us to our table was adorable! It was great to see a family owned and operated restaurant. read more

The restaurant is bright and decor looks nothing like their pictures. Service was horrible. Our waiter took the drink order and took forever to bring our drinks. Then he dropped off 2 drinks and proceeded to serve a bottle of wine to the table next to us. We were a party of eight, I had go to the hostess and tell her to get somebody to help our waiter because I was embarrassed about the lack of service at our office Christmas party dinner. The staff are untrained and unprofessional. Yelp reviews are misleading. This is not a upscale restaurant, period. read more

We were there for lunch. Ordered korma and vegetable Ayaam from lunch menu which were good. Portions were small. Naan was good too. We didn't like the buffet selection, maybe because we are spoiled by the choice in New York area. Over all good food. read more

Amazing food! Excellent service. Reasonable prices. The atmosphere is warm and comfortable.

Clay Pit, can't wait til my next visit! It's been 20 years since I dined there. The food was excellent back then and loved the atmosphere! read more

Best Indian food around! We come from Kerrville. Their cream cheese jalapeño naan with the curry mussels is the best way to start!

Work near by, go to lunch there on the regular and have not been disappointed once. The food is extremely delicious and the staff is friendly & helpful. If you get there as they open you'll beat most of the luncheon crowd. read more

Yum. Great Food. We really like Indian food and have enjoyed many dishes. For intimate dinning experience reserve a table down stairs.

I have been going to the Clay Pit for years - great food & atmosphere! Whether its drinks at the bar for happy hour (1/2 price apps til 7p), dinner in the main room, lunch buffet (very affordable $), or renting one of the private rooms to celebrate with friends, the dedicated staff at the Clay Pit continue to create an enjoyable experience. I prefer to support restaurants, like the Clay Pit, who are community-minded and assist/host fundraisers to support local non-profit social service organizations. read more

The food at Clay Pit is pretty good; they do North Indian cuisine pretty well. The service is usually great but I had a bad experience tonight. First of all there were plenty of open tables across the restaurant yet we were told that there was a wait because there weren't enough servers on hand. The service in the bar was OK, generally prompt but not very friendly. Overall a great restaurant and I think that the food is pretty good and generally authentic for the type of Indian cuisine they're offering. Service can be hit or miss though. read more

A little on the expensive side, especially for a poor college kid like me. But Indian food is my all time favourite and I'm totally picky. BUT IT IS SO DAMN GOOD. Not a super huge fan of the lunch buffet, but the actual menu is fantastic. Get the Malai Kofta! They have some pretty cool drinks, too. read more

I love this place. I've heard complaints that it's not "authentic" Indian food but those people really need to learn to read. No, it's not authentic, hence why it's "Contemporary Indian cuisine" as it says on the sign. Pros: *The food is amazing. I don't understand complaints about food quality, perhaps people have just had bad experiences. I have been here dozens and dozens of times over the past few years and have never had a single bad experience. The chicken tikka masala and the korma (I like the lamb korma the best) are unbelievably awesome (especially with some aloo naan to go along with it). *The staff has generally always been very friendly and accommodating. *The atmosphere is great - nice lighting and decor. Cons: *Somewhat expensive but not unreasonable *Lunch buffet food is much lower quality (though still good) than the dinner menu, so just be aware of that if you decide to go for the buffet. *It gets ridiculously crowded at times, so make a reservation. *It's incredibly loud in the main room; I always try to get a table in the side room or cellar, where it's quiet and peaceful. On a side note, the drinks can be hit-or-miss. It depends on the bartender that is working at the time -- one of them is GREAT and makes amazing drinks (like Mexican Martinis) but one (or possibly more) of the bartenders isn't very good. read more

I've seen some reviews call The Clay Pit "American-ized", and I'm okay with that. I appreciate them tailoring their recipes to their customer's palate. The food was excellent, as well as the server. He helped us pick out some really good dishes, was always there when we needed a refill, and was very polite and pleasant. The best part for me- most of the menu is gluten-free naturally. In fact, they have a "G" next to the dishes containing gluten. It is rare to see such an extensive gluten-free menu that isn't just sandwich fillings without the bun. We will definitely be back. The only reason I gave 4 stars instead of 5 is because I have to say something for the truly exceptional, luxurious places like Eddie V's and Estancia Churrascaria. read more

The atmosphere is great and the food is amazing. I am from California and heard of this restaurant and boy was everyone spot on the food is great the service as well. read more

Plenty of food, authentic, delicious, spicy. Could not have been happier! And an incredible staff that was very helpful when choosing courses! read more

I have enjoyed the clay pit since I moved to Austin. Everything I have tried there is great, although my favorites are the Channa Masala and Bombay Potatoes, and of course Naan. Parking can be tricky, although you can usually find a spot pretty quickly on the other side of Guadalupe. If you get a chance on a weekend and want a romantic meal, ask for a reservation in the cellar - its great. read more

The only reason I give it four stars instead of five. The service was really slow. The waiter was nice and helpful, but the food took forever. However, the food was excellent and worth the wait. read more

Being an Indian and foodie, all I can say about this place is that it does not serve authentic Indian food. Even the music they play is remotely Indian. Except chicken tandoori legs which is served on buffets, everything is just okay. Their ambiance is good though. I once ordered chicken biryani, and they were worst biryani I ever ate-too hot and too spicy. Rest of the food was just plain okay. Buffet doesnt look much promising to me. During one of the Sunday buffet, they served gulab jamun which was of very low quality. Mango pudding was good. Tilapia fish on sunday brunch was also good. Kofta was very bad, in fact they used the same Kofta balls for the curry and aloo chat. Eggplant masala was overloaded with oil, but taste was good. So, to conclude, I am not very happy with the restaurant. I gave an extra star because they give discount to UT students for lunch buffets. read more

I went to the Clay Pit last night for dinner with my aunt. We ordered the crab cakes and mussels as our appetiizers and they were both delicious!! As our entrees - I got the mixed grill, and she got the coconut curry with shrimp. Hers was much better than mine. I have to say I was not thoroughly impressed with any of the meats on my plater. We decided next time we come here we will stick to just ordering several appetizers (which are all half off during happy hour) because those were the best part of our meal - which is not a bad thing as they were delicious! read more

The amount of food you get for the price is ridiculous...... I paid $38 for chicken biryani, chicken vindaloo curry, and chicken kabobs BUT they were all kid's sizes...We waited 35 minutes for our to-go order and noticed that they charge an 5% extra on your bill for take out. Anyway, the food was quite bland. I asked for my chicken biryani to be mild but it was tastless, no flavor whatsoever. The chicken was also really fatty and had more skin and muscle in it than the actual meat. So disappointed given that the dish was $13.5 but the quality was just not there. The chicken kabob on the other hand was too heavily salted. I guess I expected a little more from a restaurant that I heard so much hype about! Will not be returning, it just doesn't seem worth it for the price. read more

Went here for a first date...it was super romantic and it was my first time trying Indian food. The service was great A+ our waiter told us a little about the building and its history which was pretty kool. The food was hot and came out quick it was so delicious:) I definitely would go back again and its also vegetarian super friendly;) read more

I get the Mirch Masala here, Desi hot because I love spice and it's always very good. If you want Indian food, this place has good stuff.

Love the food! Happy hour is great! No complaints! Oh and their curry mussels are the best!

It doesn't matter how many times I go, I love this place :-) Large enough to accommodate everyone and the food is awesome.

We came in on a wed night and found it pretty busy. Gut reaction is that this is a good sign but it turned out to mean extremely slow service - having been before I would not say service is amazing but this was painful. Hopefully management just did not plan accordingly As for the food : we got the pakoras , some naan, kabuli chicken, boti kabab and some mango lassis . The lassis and the boti were good otherwise underwhelmed by the rest read more

An average Indian restaurant. A bit American. .so don't go there if you are looking for authentic Indian flavor. .

Came in towards the end of the lunch buffet. Couple of hours pass and I'm puking yellow goop up on the side of the road. Must have been a meat dish because my vegetarian friend is fine (he said it was good). read more

We were seated on time, the server was nice and attentive. Food came out timely and hot. All of our dishes were thoroughly enjoyed, nothing blew me away but it was solidly good. Ambiance and décor were nice. For the money this place was a good deal I felt. read more

Very good food and nice ambience. Still rating them 3 because of the service and planning. Went for lunch buffet on a Sunday. The food was delicious when available. We went around 2:15pm. There were no bowls for the soup, they were out of appetizers and ran out of the dessert before we can get to it. They were only 60-70% filled up and not that busy to have not managed this. Anyway, full marks to the food and average for service. read more

Have been going to Clay Pit for about 14 years, and until the last year or so would have said it was the best Indian place in Austin. Recently their food has gone from excellent to OK, while some strong competitors have arisen. So, forgetting the past, here is a review of most recent visit (a few days ago) Service: excellent Ambiance: very comfortable, clean, slightly upscale Cost: competitive Food: generally good, sometimes very good, sometimes poor, but spotty from dish to dish and day to day. Inconsistent, but if you get a few dishes usually at least one or two will be good or very good. The food here used to taste like it had been made with freshly ground spices, and used to have complex flavors. These days it does not - lacks the freshness and complexity of the best Indian restaurants. As a result nothing qualifies as excellent, but overall it is still a good experience. One slight peeve: they used to bring popadoms to your table when you sat down, which you could munch on while choosing dinner. They stopped doing that, and that is a great pity. Makes the experience a little less enjoyable and a little more ordinary. Now to some specifics, but remember this can vary a lot from day to day. We ordered medium heat on the spices, but got close to zero heat delivered. Medium here used to be very definitely hot, but not tongue destroying. Now it seems to be blah ... no heat at all. Baighan Bhartha was very good. Best dish we had. 8 out of 10. Would have been 10 if they had used fresh spices. Not at all spicy. Chicken something: sorry, I forget the name, but this is grilled chicken with a yogurt-based paste on it. First item underneath tandoori chicken on the menu. It was rather bland and relatively tasteless. May be a good choice for young kids who don't want 'spicy" food. There was an accompanying tamarind dipping sauce, which was pretty good and definitely made the dish better, but the chicken itself should have been good without it.. 4 out of 10. Lamb Mirch Masala: very nice, but flat. This dish used to have a real cacophony of flavors, and used to be on the spicy side. Now it is definitely good, but has lost the mix of flavors, and the heat, it used to have here. Like all the other dishes, it suffers also from lack of fresh spices. Two years ago this would have been a 9/10, but now it is a 6/10. Lamb Roghan Josh: oh my god, what did they do to this dish! This used to be one of our favorites here - rich, flavorful, spicy. Now it is a thin, watery, flavorless, bland mess. A disaster on a plate. Do not order this dish. Everything else on the menu is much, much better. I would give it 1 out of 10, but the meat itself was good - tender and well trimmed, so just for the quality of meat it merits 4 out of 10, but don't order it - the sauce is awful. Naan bread: pretty good. Not one of the best, where it comes out to the table as a huge, puffy, semi-crisp, too hot to touch, scrumptious piece, but not bad. Comes out as quarter pieces neatly stacked in a basket. 6 out of 10. Garlic Naan: ditto. Potato & pea Naan: probably just personal preference but this tasted better made than the others. 7/10. Overall, a meal here is going to be decent, but not great. It used to be great, and I hope they fix whatever broke and make it great again. With the growth of Austin they may feel that OK food is all they need to keep the place full and make their margins. Time will tell. p.s. Daniela H. mentioned Tarka in her review. That is a great little lunch place for vegetarian dishes, and soups. I haven't had much luck with their meat dishes, but the veggie dishes and soups are great at Tarka. read more

Food was wonderful! Flavorful and rich. The last two times I've been there, the AC was cranked up so high that all 4 of us were uncomfortably cold from the time we walked in; we were cracking jokes about going outside to warm up but it wasn't fun. I kid you not - take a warm jacket. read more

I ordered delivery via Eat24, and while the Eat24 customer service was great, the food that was delivered was not. I actually have a hard time believing it even came from Clay Pit, as we all know is supposed be one of the best Indian restaurants in town. For starters, the naan was raw. Raw! I don't mean it was just a little undercooked, I mean that between the outer charred layers was cold dough. Dough! Perhaps they expect you to cook it yourself? Then, I was missing the drinks I ordered. Thankfully, Eat24 immediately refunded the price of the drinks. Next, the entrees were mediocre at best. I've had lots of Indian food, including Clay Pit's numerous times, and this slop was almost unrecognizable. Now even bad Indian food is better than no food at all, but I ordered from Clay Pit because I assumed the same food you get when dining in is what you can expect when delivered. Wrong. Lastly, I have received no response from Clay Pit when I complained to them directly. I can guarantee that if I had such an experience in person, they would have bent over backwards to remedy the situation. Apparently, delivery customers just don't matter to Clay Pit. Just a cautionary tail: DO NOT ORDER DELIVERY, the quality just can't be trusted, and nothing will be done if you are not satisfied with your order. read more

Very good! The Korma is by far my favorite. If you like naan you must get some here, there is normal and a garlic type. ( also if you get the korma you must dip the naan in the sauce ) the only thing was the waiter.. He asked us our order, as were about to order he just disappeared. He came back five minutes later and acted like nothing happened. Other than that it would have been perfect 5/5 read more

This place is great! My husband and I have eaten here for 4 of our last 5 anniversaries, and it's always delicious. (The one we missed, I had just had our baby!) Perennial favorites are the curried mussels to begin, seafood in garlic and red wine, rack of lamb for entrees, mango cheesecake for dessert. Great drinks and super-friendly staff. I highly recommend this restaurant! Even if you don't like or have never eaten Indian cuisine, you are sure to find something to satisfy your appetite!! read more

I went there 4 times and I have to admit that I order the same dish every time because it is so good: the Kashmiri Kofta Korma (Potato & paneer rounds cooked in a rich cashew-almond cream sauce). With U$ 11,00 it is a little pricey but it is worth every cent plus I usually cannot finish it and take the rest of it home. As a dessert I always have their mango cheesecake! So delicious and a pretty big piece. The food is worth 5 stars, but there are two things that bother me a lot and for which I give only 4 stars total: (1) Parking: there are only a few parking spots that actually belong to the restaurant, otherwise one has to pay a lot at the nearby parking garages and lots. (2) When making a reservation and arriving, the staff won't seat you until everyone of the table arrived. I went there once with 12 other people and it was awful to wait in the lobby standing where it is super crowded. read more

Great service, good ambiance, sweet and polite server "Gabby" tells me they have been in business over 15 years! Vow!! Food? Fantastic for people who pretend to eat Indian. For those who know Indian food , all I can say is "kuwwaa chalaa hunse ki chaal ......" Save yourselves the hassle. Go somewhere else. read more

Happy Hour. Curried Mussels. Naan. Repeat. I hear they also serve other things. It doesn't matter. So good. read more

Yum!! The dishes here were all so delicious! The servings are HUGE and well prices. Good service and great space. Very central location as well. read more

This was my second visit to Clay Pit. We went for the Sunday buffet and had reservations at 2:30 for 5 people. The buffet ended at 3pm and they stopped refilling the dishes before we got there as everything was pretty much empty. The dishes that remained were barely warm.The salads were oily and limp and warmer than the curry. We asked if they were putting out more samosas and raita and the answer was no. The food was barely palatable and I won't be returning. read more

Clay Pit is one of my absolute favorite restaurants in Austin. After moving from Illinois and having a favorite Indian restaurant my husband and I frequented often, I was so excited to find this place! We have gone about 3 times since we have moved here. I have always enjoyed everything I have ordered as well. It can be slow to get seated sometimes but overall I haven't had any complaints on service. read more