Curry Bowl Orlando

FOOD

Curry Bowl’s lunch buffet has included tandoori chicken, naan, samosas, chicken biryani and uttappam, bringing several distinct Indian preparations into one meal. Those dishes give a useful sense of its range, although the selection on a particular day may differ. There are meat and vegetarian choices to consider, and the interest lies in their variety: bread, filled pastry, seasoned rice and a South Indian pancake each offer something different to build a lunch around.

Tandoori chicken is a good place to begin. Curry Bowl describes its menu version as chicken marinated with house spices and grilled in a traditional clay tandoor. That cooking tradition provides a different approach from chicken served in curry sauce, with the marinade central to the preparation. It is worth looking for on the lunch spread if your usual Indian order tends to involve a bowl of gravy and enough bread to finish every last bit.

Naan brings that bread-loving appetite into the meal. The flatbread has accompanied Curry Bowl’s buffet lunches, and it makes a useful partner for the other preparations on your plate. A piece can scoop up a little curry or accompany the chicken, rather than turning the whole meal into rice with everything. There is no need to choose a permanent allegiance between bread and rice. This is lunch; we can remain diplomatically undecided.

Samosas offer another kind of accompaniment. These filled, fried pastries have also been served with buffet lunches, and potato is part of Curry Bowl’s vegetable samosa preparation. Their appeal is easy to understand alongside the softer textures of rice and sauced dishes: a pastry shell and a substantial filling in a small portion. They are worth considering early in the meal, particularly if you enjoy assembling a plate from several smaller preparations.

Uttappam gives the buffet’s repertoire a South Indian detail that deserves more than a passing mention. A thick, savory pancake, it offers a different form from either naan or a samosa. Its appearance among the lunch choices also makes sense within a restaurant that devotes part of its broader menu to dosas and other South Indian specialties. Breakfast has zero monopoly on pancakes. Here, there is a perfectly good reason to look for one at lunchtime.

Chicken biryani has been part of the buffet selection too. The rice is seasoned as a dish in its own right, with chicken incorporated into the preparation. For someone drawn to both biryani and tandoori chicken, the two offer different ways to enjoy the same protein. A little of each gives you more to explore than simply doubling up on one chicken dish, while leaving room for whichever vegetarian preparations are available.

Outside the buffet, the à la carte menu includes butter chicken, garlic naan, dosas and Indo-Chinese specialties. That is a separate set of possibilities for a return visit or an evening order. The lunch buffet offers the pleasure of sampling; the broader menu lets you follow a particular craving a little further.