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| - I really wanted to give this place four stars because the food is so good, but in the end I just couldn't, which is too bad.
My companion and I are new to Toronto and picked Aroma just by walking around King St. and looking at the different menus. When we finally made our decision and climbed the stairs to the restaurant we were greeted promptly and shown to one of the few empty tables. Some water, along with a basket of chapati and the menus, arrived promptly. Unfortunately, these were the only items to arrive promptly.
When the waiter finally came to our table we ordered a couple of Kingfishers and some lamb biryani, an order of saag paneer, and some garlic naan. We then waited, and waited, and waited some more. There was a large party that was finally getting its food, and serving this group seemed to involve the entire waitstaff. We ate our chapati, drink our now-warm water and beer, and after a full 45 minutes our food finally arrived. Both the main courses were absolutely delicious. The biryani was well-seasoned and had huge chunks of lamb, while the saag paneer had a silky texture and excellent flavor. The naan was hot and not too garlicky. The saag paneer came without rice even though we had ordered a side of basmati, but I wasn't willing to risk waiting for more food, so I used the naan as a sort of shovel for the saag paneer.
When we were finished eating our waiter gave us hot towels for cleaning up, and then we waited another 30 minutes for our check. By then we were well and truly ready to leave but it was very hard to get anyone's attention. All total we were there about
2 1/2 hours with only about 30 minutes dedicated to eating. The staff was definitely not lazy - they hustled like crazy, so either they have kitchen problems or a poor service system. The food was delicious, but the wait on both ends was just too long.
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