I went here maybe like a year ago when I was driving around the area for boredoms sake. I ended up eating here for,lunch, and I was lucky to find it with a buffet. I was sat down, brought a basket of nana, and a plate of tandoori chicken. Yum! Then I went to the buffet, where I found my favorite korma ever, and honestly...that's all I remember. Just me and that korma. It was like a romance movie. All I saw was it, and it saw me. God, now I'm hungry for korma. Whoops. read more

I actually turned my car around to visit Kolam for a quick (I thought) take-out order of channa masala and aloo paratha. It was about 4:30-5pm and the owner had to unlock the door for me. Upon entering I was immediately hit by a wall of incredibly hot, humid air - no air conditioning. It was so hot, the sweat was running down my face as I waited for my chickpeas and bread. I did ask for a small condiment sized container of mango chutney (great with bread) and was not told there was an extra charge for it. A second man came in as I was about to flee outside for some fresh air. I told him what I had ordered yet he felt the need to ask the owner, who had brought my food in a paper bag, what I had ordered - as if I had lied to him to get free food or something? Very disrespectful to treat customers as though they are liars or cheats. He began to ring me up, saying, $30-something-something. What!? For chickpeas and aloo paratha? Then he mentioned the mango chutney - $4.99. I said no, take it back, I'm not paying $4.99 for mango chutney. He adjusted the price and kept it in the bag. Well, I got home and found the aloo paratha (served in a "Delicious Chinese Food!" bag (really?) wasn't filled with anything, just a thin smear of a mashed potato-like substance, and no green peas. It was flat, it flapped open because there was nothing to keep the layers together and tasted oddly like boiled water. $6.99 for that awful rendition of what should be a delicious accompaniment to a main dish. The channa masala was good, but they only gave me a tiny Chinese food container (think of the smallest cardboard box imaginable) of rice for about 1/3 of the chickpeas. $16.99 for chickpeas in curry sauce and not nearly enough rice to make the dish whole. The "mango chutney" was a disgusting, gelatinous, jelly-like substance that tasted horrible - I threw it directly into the trash. They probably scooped it out of a jar of dollar-store mango-flavored jelly. To think they wanted $4.99 for it is criminal. This place is ridiculous; overpriced, mediocre food, and the worst thing you can be when in the restaurant business: rude. The restaurant was empty and now I realize why. NEVER going back. There are so many other quality Indian restaurants to try, in the area. Don't waste your time and money at Kolam. read more

Not friendly people, just rude ! Absolutely have no desires to spend my time and hard-working money in Kolam Restaurant again just to have mediocre food at best. While I have other Indian restaurant to choose from in the area that are nicer people along with such better food. Don't waist your time and money! read more

My husband and I went to Kolam for dinner about a week ago. The food was very good and reasonably priced compared to the last management team. We had the lamb samosas and the chicken tandoori. We will definitely eat here again . read more

Horrible service. I took clients here last Saturday evening. There were 6 of us and the wait staff was unfriendly, not helpful with our questions and basically made us feel as though we were a nuisance. I will never go back. read more

I was never a fan of Indian food until 5 years ago when I was introduced by friends to Kolam. Since then, I have done a complete about face and seek out Indian restaurants whenever traveling. I have come to find that the foods and flavors at Kolam are difficult to beat. Service: The Kolam staff is polite, friendly and attentive. The service is acceptable for the area, but nothing notable. I have never poor service here. Setting: The restaurant is an informal and clean setting with white table clothes. Entries are served family style with warmed plates. Again, the setting is acceptable for the area, but nothing notable. Food: This is the reason why you should choose to eat at Kolam. They have a full menu with emphasis on dishes from South India. Flavors are rich and spicy with fresh ingredients. Try the Gobi Lasuni appetizer. Guaranteed to make you question if cauliflower is a vegetable. If you like spicy hot, I recommend the shrimp vindaloo or lamb phaal. Very powerful, hot, and full flavored. Leftovers are great for scramble eggs vindaloo. A Taj beer moderates the heat. They do an excellent job with standard Indian dishes like tandoori chicken and chicken tikka masala as well. However, Kolams menu has many more interesting dishes you should explore. An Indian meal requires good bread and rice. Kolams basmati rice is perfect and I enjoy their onion kulcha with an entrée. Their entrées serve 2 people with normal appetites. For people that appreciate Indian food, Kolam is the real deal. read more

OK, so I'm getting kind of snobby with my Indian food, I admit it! Then again, I'm getting choosy with my Bollywood movies too. (Didn't think it was possible for Sharukh Khan to be in so many hits and flops and still have a career, but it is.) I think I'm actually starting to learn the difference between good Indian food and just plain okay. This place is not bad, just okay. Decent parking + a lunch buffet if that's your thing. I do also notice some Indians eating there, so at least it is decent. read more

Kolam - Kolam - Indian Near Me - Newtown, Connecticut

This is probably the best Indian food in the area. But that doesn't mean it deserves five stars. My wife and I visited Kolam last night with our daughter. It was fairly early - 6:15 - and we had no trouble getting a table. We DID have trouble getting menus and silverware - those didn't come until 6:25. Then we had two minutes to open the menus before the waiter arrived to take our order. We weren't ready yet, so we asked for a few minutes. No waiter. Finally the _bartender_ took pity on us and came by so we could order. We ordered the Kolam Green Salad, the Doi Murgh, the Avial, and the Bagara Baingan, plus some Naan. (By now I'm checking my watch so I know all the timings to share with other Yelpers.) Time goes by, nothing to do. Finally we asked two different servers (a few minutes apart) if they could check on our orders. We're not being impatient here - it's been 45 minutes since we ordered and we haven't seen anything come out. A few minutes later, our salad emerges. It's 7:15 (that's 45 minutes if you've been paying attention - for a salad). The salad was OK. The dressing was excellent, but the presentation was poor. It amounted to a pile of shredded iceberg lettuce with five groupings each of a thick finger of cucumber, carrot, and cheese around the edge, topped with dressing. The problem is it's hard to cut a thick slice of carrot or cucumber with a fork, so there's really no way to get one bite of everything. On the other hand, the cheese was so thinly sliced that it added no flavor at all. I'd skip the salad. Time goes by. We're pretty annoyed now, but we were taught not to complain as children so we waited longer than we probably should have. Another half hour in, somebody finally locates our dishes. The two stars come in here. The food was excellent. As a take-out restaurant we'd probably come again. None of us really cared for the Avial, but we felt that was a personal preference thing - it was well made, just not to our taste. (The sauce had a grainy, potato-soup-y texture that some like, some don't.) The other three dishes were excellent and we couldn't choose a favorite. One small downside was the lack of rice (there was nowhere near enough, and we didn't DARE try to order more at this point), but what we did have was flavorful and cooked perfectly. Finally for dessert my wife took a chance. One of the servers (not our original waiter) was now feeling bad for us and told us she would make it personally. My wife is addicted to Gulab Jamun so she gave it a go, and was pleased. It came out in just a few minutes, she loved it, we paid, and fled. 6:15p - 8:45p for two adults and one child in a mostly empty restaurant (for the first hour, anyway), ordering four relatively straightforward dishes and a salad. Excellent food. Two stars. Would come again but only for take-out. Final bill was $67, for the curious. Oh, one final note - we did not order wine but particularly for the area I felt the wine list was pretty good. Strangely, their beer list is not accurate. They have beer choices that are not listed (like Stella, which I noticed another patron ordering) - ask, if there's something you want. read more

The weekday lunch buffet was not up to par. The dessert did not taste right and the soda machine was not working properly. I go there a lot on weekends and I hope they upgrade the weekday lunch service and food. I love goi g to Kolam but disappointed this time around. I went back during a weekday and seems like they listened and updated the weekday quality. Love this place on weekends, if they keep this up I will continue to visit on weekdays! read more

Extremely disappointing and overrated. This was the worst Indian restaurant I have been too. From beginning to end, the service was poor and I felt like the wait staff was annoyed to be serving me dinner. Not once were we checked on during the meal and I had to flag down one of the waiters to get my check which was the tossed on my table before he scurried off to some more important task. If the service wasn't bad enough, the food was worse. The naan was clearly not made fresh and tasted like wonder bread. The chicken tikka was overly sweet and the chicken briyani was dry and flavorless. I wouldn't recommend this place to anybody. If you are craving Indian do yourself a favor and drive to Darien or Norwalk. read more

Easy the best Indian food I've ever had. The butter chicken was fantastic! I accidentally arrived one Sunday two hours before they opened; the gentleman unlocked the door and seated us anyway! That's class! read more

I ores food today through Grubhub, and I scheduled A pick up at 2:30 PM they had the food ready at noon and still served it to me. It was cold and sitting for two and half hours. read more

Best Indian food in the area! Chicken tikka is a favorite! Naan is good too. Highly recommended.

The food is good! We order kodi vepudu, it was awesome. The waiter over there were not caring and hasnt showed any interest. Not even a smile on the staff face when they see the guests. read more

Hands down, the best Indian food I have ever eaten in my entire life. The food here is even better then the home cooked meals I have been lucky enough to try, which rate a close second. Every other restaurant I have ever tried, in Connecticut and otherwise has been disappointing compared to Kolam. My personal favorite is their Palak Paneer, a flavorful spinach gravy with meaty chunks of Paneer cheese. Other great menu items include Chennai Kozhi Curry, and Masala Dosa. They do a great job on classics like Tikka Masala, Tandoori, Bahji, and Samasas as well. Actually, you could just feed me their Basmati Rice all day and I would still probably be happy. P.S. They have an awesome lunch buffet and a kick-ass brunch. read more

Not a pleasant experience at all. There was a 10 percent increase in their prices from their online menu. They told us," the new owners raised the prices by ten percent ". On top of that the bag exploded when we got home and stained our carpet. The price increase certainly didn't go into the bags they use. They stuffed a $60 order into one small bag that obviously didn't do the job! read more

Kolam is a decent Indian restaurant, and as far as I know the only one around here .. if you are in Newtown and want Indian, you go to Kolam. We were here on a weekend for the lunch buffet and it was well stocked with vegetarian options. Your regular steam table offerings, and fresh naan and chicken (if you eat meat i guess) .. spice level at the buffet was pretty non-existant, flavors all good but very toned down and not too exciting to the palate .. maybe ordering from the menu would be a better bet .. big parking lot, good service, friendly staff .. overall a nice little Indian restaurant. read more

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I love Indian food but my food here at Kolam was not good I ordered the chicken byrani and the vegetable samosas. Both were over powered with Garam masala and made the food unpalatable. I could not eat either. Additionally the rice had several chunks and chips of unground spices in it. and I kept getting bite after bite of hard chunks of spices which was like wood bark. This was not good at all and I cannot see myself ever coming back here again. I have never had a samosa I did not like until now. Just way too much garam masala in everything. Very disappointed with the food at Kolam and its a sin to have paid such a high price for food I could not eat and just threw out. read more

A great choice for both vegetarians and non vegetarians. The foods definitely great. Served nice and hot with an amazing collection of alcohol. read more

I'm only giving 2 stars because I had some very good Indian Food from Baltimore and NYC and this place can't compare. My wife and I were exploring the area and decided to give it a try. The garlic nan was good. We also had the Avial and Lamb Korma. The Avial was not bad, although a little bland. The Lamb Korma was supposed to be very spicy, but it was not what I was hoping for and worst of all the lamb was a bit dry and very salty! We could only eat 1/4 of it before having to stop. The portions are rather small for the price and did I mention the wait for the food took over 30/minutes? Perhaps this was a fluke and we need to try something else on the menu next time and will update our review then. read more

GREAT brunch this past Sunday at Kolam after hearing recommendations for years. The food you can tell was fresh and well seasoned and only 13.95 for the buffet. The buffet allowed me to try a wide variety of items to see exactly what I wanted. The only complaint I would have is that the only protein available in the buffet was chicken (4 different versions), it would have been nice to have a little lamb, goat, or some other type of animal thrown in there for a goof. read more

We have been going to Kolam since 2014 when we moved to Connecticut. It was one of our favorite places to eat and excellent food and service. So we just ordered for the last time. Over the past few months, the food quality has gone down drastically.. and stayed down-it wasn't a "bad nite". We will no longer be getting takeout. We used to dine in (before covid) at least once or even twice a month, with 2-8 people. During covid, we have gotten take-out almost as much. We have it a third try... just as bad and no sign of getting better since it's "new management". Too bad. read more

Excellent, never disappointed. Best Chicken tikka masala in the Newtown area. Chicken Vindaloo was great as well for those looking for more spiciness. Takeout is a breeze as everything is packed well and sorted. We tried other places and this is our favorite in the area. read more

This place served good food about few months ago, but the last couple of my experiences have not been that good. The food was bland and tasteless. The service also have deteriorated. We ordered Chicken Tikka here last time but it was not cooked good and tasted raw. I could still smell and taste the raw spices. I will be avoiding this place in the future read more

I looooooove Indian food, so I was super excited to try this place! and boy it didn't disappoint, now I go back as often as I can. VERY good Indian food- good quality, nice selection, good prices, and an awesome lunch buffet! There mango chutney is truly mouthwatering, and my favorite meal has to be the chicken tikki- they make it perfect! As far as the service goes- sometimes it can be a bit slow, but usually its not that bad, all depends how busy they are. And the décor and atmosphere is exactly what you would expect from an Indian restaurant- but its not bad at all. Overall I would tell everyone to try this place!! Even if you don't think you like Indian food- this place is worth a try cause the food is great. If you want to sample everything try their very well priced lunch buffet- its a great deal! And I always tell people trying Indian food for the first time to try chicken tikki- its a safe and delicious choice! And don't forget to get Naan, its soooo good! Only thing I can complain about is one time I went to the lunch buffet and the food seemed like it had been sitting out for a bit- but every other time besides that was great! Try Indian food and try this place!! read more

My absolute favorite Indian cuisine in the area. Been going here for many years and have never been disappointed. Also, I believe the have buffet at lunchtime every single day. I can remember a Sunday a few years back when I cajoled my friend into joining me at the buffet here. Food was so great and we both left stuffed. Only problem for my friend was it was Easter Sunday and he had to be over at his mom's place for a big dinner just two hours later. He told me it was a real struggle at his family's dinner table after the grand Indian buffet we just had that day! Keep up the great cooking Kolam! read more

My first time here. I came on the recommendation of my daughter who just moved into the area. I had the best chicken curry ever. My daughter, a vegetarian, loves the food. I did take out and the staff was pleasent to deal with. The price is a little higher than in my area but the excellent food is worth the few extra dollars. Don't be fooled by the quaint appearance o. The outside, the dining room looks very warm and inviting. I will definitely travel the 40 miles to have a sit down dinner there. read more

Phoned in an order (actually my wife did) and when I got home noticed they made a mistake. When I called them they blamed my wife for the mistake. Did they try to make it up to me? No. Definitely the last time I order from them (and I've ordered dozens of times in the past). read more

Great Indian restaurant in the area. Delicious food and super friendly and accomodating staff. We went here for the lunch buffet over the weekend and what an awesome experience. It's just $13.95/person and they have a good variety of foods for you try out. Additionally, you get naan, chicken tandoori, and potato dosas brought to your table!! It's a nice little extra to the buffet offerings. You can also ask for more of these items as well if you'd like! We'll definitely be back and highly recommend this place to all in the area. read more

When my wife and I moved out of the city, we were (naturally) concerned about having a good, diverse selection of restaurants in our new neck of the woods. As far as good Indian food goes, Kolam set those concerns at ease. It's really, really good, and not over-the-top expensive. And while I've only been for sit-down dinners but have it on good authority that the lunch buffet is top notch too. read more

These guys have one of the best Indian lunch buffets in the area. For just $8.95 during the week, you get Tandorri Chicken, Naan, and a selection of tasty dishes like Chicken Korma, Lamb Phaal, or Palak Paneer (a cheese and spinach dish, don't knock it till you try it!), and dessert. Honestly, I prefer going there for lunch instead of dinner... it's cheaper and you get a larger selection of food to pick from. read more

Very tasty Indian food -- I'm never disappointed whenever I get food from Kolam. Their naan is fantastic. They also have a really good lunch buffet on Mondays through Fridays for $9.95 with some great selections -- and really, who can resist buffets? ESPECIALLY if it's Indian food? And if you're into spicy, don't miss out on their Chicken Vindaloo. My stomach hates me three hours later, but it's so worth it. read more

mmm mmm MMMM!! yum yum yummy!!! Had the buffet even though I really wanted my fav sag(anything) The veggie selections were definitely the heroes on my plate, dunno what they were sorry. BUT damn was it good! the raita(very important to me) was on the watery side, but served its purpose and was good. The mango lassi= perfect. Chicken tikka M = dry but tasty. chicken jalfrezzi = good mildly spicy (still enough to make me want to hit someone) the kheer = superlicsious Overall, the experience was pleasant and the food unexpectedly better than good. I shall return. Again, I'm mad i've been driving past this place for like 3 years. Why the hell didnt one of you tell me stop and smell the curry?!?!?!? read more

The meal I just had at Kolam was perfect! We ordered two tandoori meals, chicken and a mixed vegetable and meat plate, and they were truly incredible. The chicken was cooked perfectly and was amazing with the yogurt sauce. On the mixed plate, the lamb kabobs were perfectly spicy and delicious. To go with the dinner, I ordered a mango lasse and it was delicious and sweet. Also, the service was perfect. Most important for parents of two small kids, we were in and out in 50 minutes! We weren't rushed at all and left perfectly happy. The quick service meant more time for us before the babysitter had to leave. Perfect evening! read more

Visited this week and noticed the change immediately. Learned they are under new ownership. Found the complex flavor of spices, we have long missed, in this food. To me, it's more authentic Indian than other places I have visited over the years. Complex, perfectly spiced and delicious. What a pleasant surprise! The waiter was lovely as well! Restaurant impeccable and floor finally evened out toward the old buffet area. We plan to be back many times if the food quality keeps up. It's been days and I am already looking forward to the next visit!!! read more

This was my very first Indian food experience and I really enjoyed it. I had a chicken tikka masala, and it was amazing. I got to try my friends food and it was also very good. Very friendly people and very careful with the kid dairy allergies ! read more

I live in the area, and have never dined here. That is a pity.. I had visitors from the Carribean, and they wanted something ethnic, so why not try it, I have past it a million times. WOW, the place was great, great food, pleasant atmosphere, and great service with a smile. read more

Very expensive for the quantity offered. I ordered a veg and chicken lunch special and they charged me 20% higher than what's on the menu. When I asked why I was told it is because they are giving me extra naan/ rice which I haven't really asked for. read more

It's hard to find good Indian in CT. Kolam luckily doesn't disappoint. Their buffet is amazing, great veggie and meat selection and they always mix it up which I love. Been coming here for years and go back at least monthly. Highly recommended if you have an Indian food craving! read more

The food is good, I have always enjoyed my meals. My only knock I'd say is atmosphere could be better. There is no real competition if you looking for Indian cuisine in the area. read more