makhani | Johnny Prime

Nestled below a pole dancing and twerking school (I shit you not; you can see the poles in the windows above the right hand side of the entrance in the photo), is Akbar Palace.

We scored a flash deal for this joint: $20 gets you $40. The management was nice enough to honor our Groupon even after the expiration date too, which was cool.

Each table gets some flat cracker type bread with some chutneys.

There was tamarind sauce (left), apricot chutney (center), and a really nice tomato, onion and pepper chutney that I never tried before (right). That was my favorite of the three.

We started with a pair of apps that sounded delicious but ended up being a bit flat from our expectations. First was the pepper crusted scallops. I liked that they had a good grilled-on-the-flattop flavor, but the portion size was a bit small.

Same goes for the crispy calamari. The tempura-esque coating was interesting, though I didn’t get that curry leaf flavor that I expected from the menu description.

My wife ordered a boneless lamb dish but got semi-bone-in goat instead. No matter – it was really tasty, and the meat was tender.

I had chicken makhani, which is like chicken tikka, but served in a mildly spicy tomato and yogurt sauce. This was pretty good. The meat was of good quality and the sauce was nice over rice, or on top of the naan bread.

The naan was good. It was soft, yet crisp, and had good texture from the tandoori oven flames. It was lightly coated with olive oil as well.

We skipped dessert since we had the lassis earlier. They were smooth and creamy, tart and sweet, and ice cold. Perfect. This place is known for its mango lassis. They are truly excellent, so if you go here, make sure you try one.

I felt that the bill was a bit high even after applying our $40 credit to it. We still had to shell out $50 for the remainder, the tax and the tip. Does this look like a $90 meal to you? I don’t know… I’m starting to think that some of these Groupon deals aren’t so good. As Admiral Ackbar would say (namesake of this restaurant?): IT’S A TRAP!