The non-vegetarian thali at Sitar Indian Cuisine.
I’ve only had Indian food a couple times in my life and neither experience was anything to dwell on. That, plus my general lack of enthusiasm for spicy foods, has kept me from really seeking out Indian cuisine. However, watching Anthony Bourdain eat his way around India on the Travel Channel recently gave both Courtney and me a craving for Indian food, so we decided to give Sitar Indian Cuisine in Durham a try last night. We saw that the restaurant had been voted to have the best Indian food in the Triangle — so says the coupon anyway — so we were hoping this would be an improvement over our past experiences.
The first good sign: the parking lot was almost full — at 6:30 on a Tuesday evening! — when we arrived. We were worried we would have to wait for a while, but fortunately, most of those people were attending a dinner meeting of the Triangle Population Center, and we got seated right away. The restaurant had a decent-sized dining room. It was a little bit noisy when those wild Triangle Population Center party-goers were congregating around the buffet line, but the volume died down as soon as they went into their private dining room and started eating (good sign No. 2). Then they started showing a Powerpoint presentation titled “The Ecuador Amazon-UNC Project Since 1989: Methods or Madness?” That title slide actually had us intrigued, but unfortunately, one member of the party soon got up and closed the sliding doors to the dining room, so we never found out whether it was methods or madness.
Clockwise from left: raitha, dal, goat curry, lamb korma, basmati rice.
As for the food, we each ordered the non-vegetarian thali — basically a combo platter. It was a good way to sample a variety of dishes, as each serving came with your choice of two meats, along with dal, samosa, naan bread, basmati rice, raitha, and rice pudding. For our meat dishes, we got the chicken tikka masala, lamb saag, lamb korma, and goat curry. While we waited for our food, we snacked on crispy tortillas dipped in three different sauces — a green sauce that tasted like a hot salsa, a dark red sweet sauce, and a mild chutney.
Our food came out fairly quickly. Each of our orders came on a metal tray, with each item in the platter in its own metal bowl. After the first bite, it was obvious that this was better Indian food than either of us had ever had. A couple more bites, and we both knew we would be coming back. The chicken tikka masala had a nice sweetness to it, and the lamb korma was covered in a delightful almond and cashew sauce. The lamb saag, which was dark green since it was cooked with spinach, tasted much better than it looked and carried a little bit of a kick. The goat curry was good, too, though you couldn’t really discern the flavor of the goat meat because it was concealed by the strong curry.
The sides were excellent as well. The dal — a lentil stew — actually had probably as much a kick as any. The naan was soft and tasty, especially when dipped in the thick, flavor-rich sauces in the meats. The basmati rice had a very nice fragrance that was enhanced when you top it off with — what else — the sauces from the meats. And when we had eaten just about all we could, the chilled, slightly sweet rice pudding provided the perfect finish to the meal. We were stuffed, but there were still plenty of food left. In fact, we took home enough food for at least a meal for one. On our way out, we sampled the “mints” sitting near the door. It was basically a mix of tic tacs with anise seeds. The minty, herby mix was a nice way to cap a meal that delivered a dash of sweetness, a dash of heat, and a whole lot of good eating.