Averaging out a 5/5 score for the decor and food with a 2/5 score for the service.
We dined at Kailash Parbat on a Thursday evening. First time trying the place, and the food and aesthetic were recommended to us by multiple friends. The place has been open for less than a month, but it's already packed -- even on weekday nights!
Location: Kailash Parbat is new to Dublin, but they've boldly opened their doors right across from the stalwart Bay Area chaat restaurant Chaat Bhavan!
Decor: The decor is super cute and well thought-out -- lots of references to Mumbai and Bollywood culture, and even an old telephone booth in the corner. Very Instagrammable, and very different from the orientalist, outdated decor you see at most Indian restaurants in the US.
Drinks: no alcoholic beverages, just nostalgic Indian non-alcoholic options! My group ordered sweet lassi, fresh lime soda, and jaljeera. All of the drinks were very authentic -- the yogurt base of the lassi was nice and tart, the fresh lime soda was made with both sugar and salt, and the jaljeera was "masaledaar" (full of spice and flavor). A couple of people in my party felt that the jaljeera was a little too "masaledaar" and had to order some yogurt on the side to balance out the spice. I will say that the drinks felt a bit too expensive for the portions, but the presentation and taste were great.
Food: The food was excellent! We ordered the chaat platter (which serves 3), vada pav, ragda pattice, and a paneer tikka appetizer. I love that they had a chaat sampler so we didn't have to choose one dish each. The only drawback is that the platter was a bit small, so it's more of an appetizer than a shareable meal. The vada pav was delicious but very spicy -- like tear-inducing spicy. Same with the ragda pattice, but the highlight of that dish was the presentation. The patties were in these adorable heart shapes, and the ragda was served in a little pail! I ordered the classic paneer tikka appetizer, which the server recommended over the haryali paneer tikka. The texture of the paneer was amazing, and the flavors were nice... I feel like it was missing something but I'm not sure what. Anyway -- dine here expecting authentic Indian flavors and spice levels.
Service: Oof. I will preface this by saying that they were busy -- but overall, it was very clear that the same attention to detail given to the decor and the food has not been given to customer service. When our name came up on the list, we were escorted to our table by the manager who was very polite and wore a nice blazer that sort of matched the decor. However, it kind of went downhill from there. One of the seats at our booth wasn't clean -- which we had to point out to the manager. He immediately had an employee clean it off with napkins, but there was still a little bit left that he missed.
Our server was spatially and socially awkward, and simply not good at her job. When we asked her what items contained peanuts (because we had an allergy at the table), she smiled, blankly stared at us, and said that a lot of things contain peanuts. We had to ask her to go and ask the kitchen what items these specifically were. She would come over to the table and awkwardly hover while inputting our order into her tablet (which for some reason wasn't done while we were ordering our food?). I asked for an extra menu once we had ordered our starter, and she stuck it right in front of my face when I was about to start eating. It didn't seem like she registered any of our second orders, so I called her back to the table and asked if she wanted to read our order back to us. She sheepishly smiled at me and asked if I could just tell her the order again. She seemed nice, but was informal in a way that made me feel uncomfortable and honestly annoyed as a customer. Oh also - I was trying to treat my group to a meal, and she came and loudly announced the total amount the meal had come out to at the end instead of discreetly handing me the tablet. They really need to do a better job of giving their staff training on professionalism.
Food running was also awkward. Food was just placed generally wherever on the table instead of in front of the person who ordered it. The staff was not courteous/particularly mindful when it came to clearing dishes either. They took our water glasses after we had just asked for another bottle of water, and we had to ask for more.
The manager filled in for our server at one point to take our drink order, but he was very busy and got kind of rude with us when we had a question about a drink that he wasn't understanding. He was fine for the rest of the meal, and we made small talk after.
Overall, the service was not up to the standard set by the decor and menu -- which are impeccably well thought-out. If they could train their staff to ensure that service is on the same level as their strengths, this place would be unmatched. read more