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| - With over 50 items on an extensive menu ranging from noodles, wraps, dosas, pav bhaji, soup, parathas, Naan, biriyani and several types of curries, Café Delhi is trying to be a typical Indian fast food bistro. Sadly, I can't say it succeeds. What these types of joints back india get right is consistency. Also, the cook making dosas would focus just on that and the cook handling the Indo-Chinese preparations wouldn't also be in charge of biriyani. That's how they turn around high quality despite the breadth of menu offerings. Without that kind do staffing, it's unsurprising that Café Delhi doesn't get much right. Not even their masala chai. My spring dosa was missing the 'assortment of veggies', per their menu and was instead just overstuffed with a ton of potato. The paneer is chewy and the chilly paneer arrived sitting in a pool of oil. The naan is just about as good as frozen store bought naan. (Choolaah in Shadyside for me is the gold standard of paneer and naan.) The gobi manchurian is the only item remotely well prepared. Servers are way too busy to make recommendations or even eye contact for that matter. The dishes are simply plonked on the table randomly wherever they find empty space and one's left to figure out which one is whose. I wasn't too happy with cleanliness levels either.
I've given this place a few tries and I get that Café Delhi satisfies a certain type of patron. If I needed my Indian-food-fix on a regular, almost daily basis, needed variety and if I didn't know how to cook, then maybe I'd've lowered my standards. But none of that applies to me and hence the rating. I wouldn't go to or recommend Café Delhi unless someone in the group really NEEDS chaat or a dosa that night.
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