Viceroy Indian Restaurant

Had a great lunch at Udipi Bhavan today. Buffet was plentiful and the dishes were some of the tastiest I have had of the multiple Indian buffets around the area. I am more or less vegetarian so I appreciated that there were no restrictions and I could try everything. Some of the dishes were mild and some had good spicy heat to them, but nothing too spicy. The only area of improvement is to get proper napkins. We were having to use beverage napkins, which made a bit of a mess and didn't do the job. Small thing, but worth mentioning. I will definitely be back with more people.

Good Indian buffet. A bit more spicy than some others. They offer nice selection of meets, but lacked some of vegetables. The restaurant was opened recently, it has two giant rooms that looked empty and a bit uninviting, but should be good for large gathering.

Being "Anglo" (what my Indian friends call me), I was not familiar with Indian food or culture etc. I had never tried any Indian dish. I had always heard from others about their distaste of Indian food. So I suppose I had a negative predisposition going into my experience. My friends indicated we would be going to Viceroy because it was the freshest of all the others and the taste of the food was better. I assume Indian people know Indian food! Looking around, I observed the interior was clean and well maintained. The tables and booths were clean and in good condition. The ceiling was not dirty having stains from the previous business that leased the space. There was the smell of incense in the air but not so much to make you think the place was on fire. The walls were nicely painted and the pictures appeared to match the genre of the cuisine. While seated we were kindly asked what we would like to drink. Some ordered tea, a friend ordered a drink made from mango and yogurt. I preferred good old Diet Coke. The waiter then told us to help ourselves. The buffet table had quite the variety. The dishes were nicely organized. The labels on the sneeze protection glass had the Indian dish name followed by the English equivalent. This was convenient. Looking over the selection, I didn't know where to start. There were lots of different curries (I previously thought curry was the spicy hot white sauce served with chicken- What did I know?). I chose a small amount of everything. The dishes were organized by vegetarian and non-vegetation curries. There were different sauces, including plain yogurt, to add additional flavor to your entree. At the end of the buffet table there were puddings and various desert options as well. I have to admit, I’ve not been to adventurous in the past when it comes to trying new food. With Indian food, I knew I was going to have to be adventurous because of my negative predisposition. Let me preface my next comments with this statement, “My eyes have been opened and my pallet expanded”! I consider myself a typical American. I like butter, salt and pepper on my potatoes. I was not a fan of things I considered “hot”. After trying Indian food, I believe “Hot” should be only used to describe the temperature of the food. Spice or Spicy should be the appropriate adjective to describe certain flavors. My pallet had grown accustomed to only experiencing a small array of flavors. When flavors got to be a little spicier than I would like, I would shun those because my brain associated “Spicy = Pain”. Food with friends shouldn’t be having a contest to see which Anglo’s face could be the reddest nor should the food be used primarily as a nasal decongestant. So let’s just say my pallet had some expanding to do. I’m not even going to go into all the spices in the food since this is supposed to be an evaluation of the restaurant. But in summary, I love Indian food now! Sadly, the Viceroy location in Irving was sold due to popularity and a new Indian food restaurant under a different name/different owner came in to replace them with a different menu. This is when I noticed how spoiled I had been. For over a year and a half, I looked for a comparable (quality, freshness, flavor and courteousness) restaurant without success. It wasn’t until recently I met with one of my old Viceroy buddies (Mahesh) and he notified me that the old owner opened a new restaurant in Frisco under the same name. I went and I experienced the same level of quality, freshness and courteousness I expected from his first restaurant. This time I was there for the evening meal. By the way, the owners wife is the cook. My favorite dishes are Lemon Rice, Chicken Biryani (spicy but made mild if you ask for the white yogurt cucumber sauce to add on the side), chicken 65 with Garlic Nan. I would recommend going during the lunch buffet and try the different dishes. Then you will know what you like. A Great experience! I’m glad they’re back. Enjoy!