ottawa foodies

Hello OFs!

Need your guidance and opinion yet again for family-dining matters :) My grandma is here to visit and her birthday is coming up! The fam-jam is thinking we will take everyone out to an Indian buffet dinner to celebrate. My grandma being from Myanmar can definitely handle her spice (and so can the rest of the family except me...), so no need to dial down the heat or appease mild palates.

Please recommend the tastiest, scalp-sweat-inducing spice-happy Indian buffets around town!

For reference, I've been to lunch buffets at Haveli and East India Company - they were both decent, but are there better choices?

Haveli and EIC are the best bets for nice atmosphere and decent food. If you're intent on a lunch buffet, Little India Cafe has a great reputation for authenticity but it is small and dingy. People like Ceylonta but I find the dishes too sweet and the buffet quality to be a step down from their menu fare.

I'm sorry to say that you'll likely find that lunch buffets have their chili heat levels uniformly toned down. I know Haveli pushes up the Scoville factor on their à la carte Vindaloo, but you won't find that on their buffet.

Not a buffet, but someone from Myanmar might enjoy Chahaya Malaysia--which of course is cuisine from Malaysia not Myanmar--but the spicy-fishy dishes (see Laksa) would likely be well received by her palate.

Aahar - the Taste of India does a good lunch buffett (Mon-Fri).

But .... I'm sure Raj, at Indian Express Food and Sweets, could do a customized meal for your family. His new place is clean and family oriented. And an assortment of his Indian sweets would make it very celebratory.

Little India Cafe (great Naan), or Coconut Lagoon (a dish like butter chicken but made with salmon instead).

Another vote for Aahar.

If you're looking for something in the East end. Coconut Lagoon on St. Laurent has a lumch buffet. I haven't tried the lunch buffet but I have eaten there for dinner several times and the food is very good. The dishes are South Indian style.

Coconut Lagoon is great, but not for their naan. I don't think they have a real tandoor (I think cicrular stone oven, wood fired and the bread baked against the sides). They do their naan in a regular oven I think.

Little India has a real tandoor, and you can taste the woody flavor in naan and their tandori chicken too.

I'd go with CCs suggestion of getting one of the restaurants to setup a nice dinner for you. That probably won't be too much more expensive than a buffet, and will be better quality and more towards your tastes. My favorite Indian place is Mia's Indian Cuisine, on Richmond.

Mia's, Little India, Taj and Ceylonta are all glorious BUT... if you are a big group, you might want to consider East India Company mainly because they have the space to accommodate a big group without smashing you up against walls, other tables, requiring half the table to get up to let one person out, etc. Otherwise, Mia's or Ceylonta Somerset are probably your best bet.

Thanks for all the suggestions OFs! One tiny correction - we're thinking of doing a DINNER buffet :)

There will be 9 of us together, so I'm wondering now if it'll be a better option to just order a bunch of dishes and make our own buffet experience? It might come out to the same price and we can choose spicier dishes or favourite dishes as opposed to being limited to what's already available in the buffet.

Any additional thoughts/suggestions greatly appreciated!

In the past, Ceylonta has offered an evening, multi-dish meal package for groups. I'm not sure if they still do, but it might be worth a call. It was like a buffet, but served on platters directly to our table.

Edited to add: Looks like they still do!

www.ceylonta.com/?page_id=15

lol... oops. Qster, I read your final mention of lunch buffet and completely ignored your bolded dinner buffet. That restricts things somewhat. You definitely won't save money ordering dishes rather than a buffet, but the quality will be significantly better. That's a personal decision you'll have to make. :)

If it's just a matter of increasing the heat, I'm sure you can ask for some chili oil or something to get the buffet up to 11 on a scale of 1 to 10.

Cost effective plan: buffet at East India Company or Haveli with chili oil upgrade.
Money-is-no-object plan: a la carte banquet feast at Taj or Mia's.

Making me hungry!

Coconut Lagoon a la carte. Their buffet is excellent too.

Has anyone tried the Sunday dinner buffets at Aahar or Host India? :D

I have at Aahar. Its good, but small. There is always Tandoori Chicken, pakoras, chana masala (or some kind of chick pea dish)Usually a beef or lamb curry and butter chicken, plus a couple different veggie dishes. Plus there is always salad, fresh fruit and at least 1-2 Indian sweets. And Naan of course.

They use the 1/2 size hotel pans so the food doesn't sit around for very long, they are constantly replacing the pans.

aahar is really good. our go to place for take out.