Raasa

I have eaten Indian food in 8 different states. Three and a half stars is not at all accurate! This place is much better than that! Totally enjoyed my entire meal!

Great place!
Service: The staff are helpful and so friendly. They help you with the menu if you’re not familiar with Indian food.
Ambience: When you walk in, you just know off the back they took time selecting every single detail in that restaurant. Average noise level — family friendly restaurant/​couple
Food: the food is good — real authentic Indian food. They even have a few Indian street food selection — feeling like your in India but just in Yonkers haha

It’s starting to fade. Seems this happens with every Indian restaurant in Westchester. They may start strong but then they try to skimp to make more profit and Rassa feels that way. The buffet choices (especially desert) get weaker and the entrees are hit or miss but still an ok value for what you pay. The service is really good so no fault there. Why can’t Indian food in Westchester be like Long Island or Jersey…

My husband and I had planned a nice dinner at an Indian restaurant in pleasantville, but the service there was so awful we left our table (we’ve never left a restaurant before by the way). We’d heard great things about Raasa so we went there instead. The décor was beautiful– elegant and cozy– and the service was top notch. The food, however, was spectacular. We’ve dined at Indian restaurants all over NYC and this food was as good as any we’ve ever had! I’ve already recommended it to my friends who like Indian food, and I’m recommending it now to anyone who’s reading this review.

I ordered my Indian staple Chana Saag and one nan to go. The bill came to over $ 20 and it was mediocre at best, and very salty.

Things have changed since we last did lunch at Rassa; appetizers are still buffet style, but the price of the meal depends upon which main plate you order. In addition to a tandoor platter and some South Indian vegetarian options they offer a choice of one of five proteins with one of five sauces, along with rice, lentils and naan served to the table. There’s a desert of the day on the buffet as well. Although the onion ring appetizer had sat out too long and the flame could have been turned up on the appetizer chafing dishes, overall the offerings were solid and since the mains were served to the table we were able to take what we didn’t finish with us. We’ll try not to wait so long before we return again!

I know, I should slap my cheek for going to this place again. However, I decided to give it one more chance try their Pre fix menu.
Definitely a good idea for restaurants cause they will not have to waste a lot of food but I bet at Raasa customers waste a lot of it on their plates.
For appetizers they had a small spread of Broccoli soup (which tasted like cream of Broccoli mixed with Rasam), onion and spinach Pakoda, corn salad, a chicken dish and dahi vada which only had the dahi and no vada in it.
The entrée had several options especially for vegetarians. I selected the Uthappam, idli and vada platter. The Uthappam was good to start with but, as I came to the center part I noticed it was still very battery meaning it was not cooked properly. So I turned my attention to the Rava Idli. To my disappointment it was rock hard. It looked like it was frozen for several days and thawed in the microwave an hour before it landed on my plate. And so my eyes settled on the last piece on the platter: Medu Vada. One bite and it ended up with the rest of the food on the platter.
The dessert was not bad. Mango Rava Kesari.
Will I go to this place again? With one one cheek already red, definitely NO!

After reading the NYTimes review of Raasa, I pulled a friend along for dinner over what turned out to be a very busy Labor Day Weekend! Being very familiar with North Indian cuisine, and wanting to sample more than just one dish, we ordered appetizers. Because of the NYT review, I had Kalonji (black sesame seed) Scallops at the top of my list. We also added the Cochin Kekda and Corn Makhai, a crab dish and veggie samosas, respectively.
I thoroughly enjoyed sampling unfamiliar dishes with familiar spices, and would go back just for the scallops. The food was not oily at all, a common issue at South Asian restaurants, and I was thrilled about that. If anything, our rosemary naan could have used more butter to enhance the flavor.
Keeping with the attitude to try new things, I ordered the coconut lychee daiquiri. My gut was right — I’m not into tropical nor sweet drinks. The lychee fruit was a nice, yummy touch. Next time I’ll try the orange and ginger infused bourbon drink that I really had my eye on.
I’d recommend this for a couple’s dinner, and definitely a family dinner. Given the full house on a holiday Saturday, make reservations to be safe. Restaurant is airy, spacious and brightly lit, so you can actually read the menu! Though service at times felt a bit disconnected, the FOH staff was kind, nonetheless, and I’m confident that issue will be resolved. The husband-​wife team were excellent hosts and attentive to their guests.

Great food
Service wise: attentive but very forgetful. Slow wait for food.
I would give 2 ½ if it wasn’t for the delicious food

Beautiful designed restaurant, this place is solid, we were seated immediately, an amazing dining experience. attentive staff they give an vip treatment to each an every guest. which is very rare to see. i love the service. we where 2 people .
As we started off with my kingfisher beer n desi khatta, n as all mumbaikar“s kheema is my fav, i ordered patili ka kheema and bagara jhinga, they both where yum .
the ambience was good, the manager name ashok was very informative and friendly, very impressive .
then i jump on to my entrees which was tandoori lamb chops, malwani masa, baigan ka bhartha, goat biryani .
i must say that all food was great, authentic taste, but the man of the match was malwani masa. The michelin star restaurant chef, peter beck has done an amazing job .
and finishing our great experience with mango shrikhand and kulfi falooda was heaven .
overall great place for authentic india taste.

Don’t fill up on the soup/​appetizer bar if your order the $ 12 lunch special. The tandoori chicken wings and chicken hara are pretty good, but the bhaji and potato pakoras aren’t all that great. The lentil dumplings in yogurt sauce are standard.
The entrees more than made up for any disappointment. You choose a protein and a sauce. Fish with tawa was a generous portion of a meaty white fish in an aromatic pepper based sauce. It was more like a stew than the other tawas I have experienced. Lamb with korma sauce was an equally fine serving of a meat that has just about disappeared from Indian lunch buffets, in a mild, yet flavorful gravy. Fresh naan brought to the table, was perfect for dunking in the bowls of dal.
Rose water flavored ice cream, dotted with flecks of pistachio arrived before we could stop the waiter (as we were stuffed).
A great value for $ 12.

Came up to visit my parents from Manhattan and found this Indian restaurant to be a gem. Service was impeccable. The décor is simple and clean. All of the food delicious and came in a timely manor. I’ve eaten Indian in NYC, London and others in Westchester and this is one of the top choices. Their street cart options were fun to pick off of. Vegetarian options were a plenty as were Meat. And we ordered Puri special even though it wasn’t on the menu. Seemed to be family run. And I didn’t get to try the cocktails, but the list looked very intriguing for next time. Five stars all around!

Beautifull restsurant exellent food the owner is very creative with all the details, to me personal 5 starts… food fantastic and very tasty…

The new management has been mediocre since the South Indian dishes (the namesake) now do not taste authentic anymore. We miss the weekend buffets. Ask the staff about the buffet and they will say «it is a different sort of a buffet where you can order from the menu»!!! My advice to the new management– Bring back the buffet! Most regulars are now avoiding this place to go to Royal Palace or Jaipore where they still have awesome weekend buffets!

I went for lunch with a large party of 16, we call before going there and they already had the table setup for us. Very nice Indian food restaurant with new managers so they don’t do the buffet anymore.
I order the Mango Lassi: It is made from yogurt, water and mango pulp. It may be made with or without additional sugar. Mango lassi is a cold drink consisting of sweetened kesar mango pulp mixed with yogurt, cream, or ice cream. Kind of pricey but good. I also order the Biryani is a mixed rice dish from the Indian Subcontinent. It is made with spices, rice and meat or vegetables in this opportunity a choose chicken. This also come with a good salad, I also order some naan that is a leavened, oven-​baked flatbread nothing special about this disk, i only like the taste.
They were kind to give us a free a Kheer: is a South Asian rice pudding made by boiling rice, broken wheat, tapioca, or vermicelli with milk and sugar; it is flavoured with cardamom, raisins, saffron, cashew nuts, pistachios or almonds. I did not like the taste of this dessert.
The server was good, the bus boy was on top of our table refilling with water.

Mint and bright as I walked through the door were the two words on my mind.
The owner is really pleasant and has been very creative with the menu. Familiar Indian dishes taste even better than I remember any place else.
My wife and I have returned here already and our second visit on a date without the kids was equally sumptuous.
After a long break we returned here with the whole family and somehow the food has improved yet again. T’was already one of my favorites but now it has soared to a higher level in ranking.
I like the new buffet special too. The salmon dish is memorable for just $ 14 with a lot of other choices to go with it and of course the garlic naan to die for.
To top it off the mango dessert, wow! I didn’t need anything else after that. The waiters are attentive too so what more can you ask for?
I’ll be back guys.

Very disappointed with food and here is why. This restaurant started with the new name «Raassa» after being «Malabar Hill» for years. We went there thinking things will be the same, but we were wrong.
To start with, we went there for lunch buffet during a weekday.
1) Not enough food — There was not enough food in the trays, so when go to take them, the tray is empty. Then i had to ask the server to fill in the food and he brings in a small container (enough for 5 or 6 people) and that food will disappear in 5 — 10 minutes. Then it will take them another 10 minutes to refill the tray’s and this cycle continued through out the duration with almost all the items.
2) Only two non veg — Lamb vindaloo & Chicken Tikka Masala. They will bring a complimentary tandoori chicken to each table (one per person is the count) and they wont ask if you want more if the plate is finished. Taste of all three items here are marginal at best.
3) The complimentary Masala Dosa had no Masala inside plus it had no taste. I went to get some «sambar» to eat with the Masala Dosa and that tray was empty and they did not have any chutney either. So you are forced to eat this without any sides.
4) Only one desert Rasagula — that was not even sweet and it looks like they added water for the gravy as it was so thin.
Overall it is definitely not worthed to go to this place and i wont definitely come back.

Disappointed in the service. Their website lists lunch buffet as running Monday-​Friday from 11:45 — 2:45. We showed up at 2:15. They had a sign outside the door saying «We’re open» in big letters. We open the door to a not-​particularly-​friendly «we’re closed» from the waiter. We mentioned that their website lists them as being open to 2:45. Waiter responds with «oh, that’s wrong.»
I might’ve just been disappointed but gone another day to try them out if he had at least given a «sorry», acted friendly, or made some sort of motion that they’ll fix the website. Instead we just got shooed out of the place. There are enough other Indian restaurants around that will treat you decently that better deserve your business than this place.

Man, I don’t know about this place. We had high hopes just because of some of the picture we saw on Unilocal.
Being Indian, we have a fairly good idea of how Indian restaurants present themselves. Usually, the décor is nothing to laud over– it’s boring, dark, and just blah. Raasa is the opposite. It’s actually decorated in a simple yet modern way. They even use mason jars, like they do for sweet tea in the south which, for an Indian restaurant, is unique. Whoever decorated Raasa deserves credit for building a welcoming Indian restaurant.
That is where anything that resembles hype over a new Indian joint ends. The food is quite bland, standard, and just tired. Again, we were expecting a menu to match the décor– like modern Indian or something. It just wasn’t.
We went for the lunch buffet. We got there around 1:30. There was only one other customer dining. We were confused since every other drab Indian restaurant we’ve ever been to always had a decent lunch crowd no matter the day.
The buffet line up is sparse to say the least. The had two meat dishes and about 4 veggie dishes. They bring you tandoori chicken, naan. and masala dosa to the table. I didn’t try the tandoori chicken but my wife thought it was alright but rather dry. The naan was nothing to write home about. The masala dosa was embarrassing. We’re South Indian– which means dosas are part of our staple cuisine. This just wasn’t acceptable and quite honestly– it just shouldn’t be offered if it’s not made right.
We ordered a mango lassi which we thought was good. They had one dessert option– a sorry vat of rice pudding. We didn’t even bother with it.
Other stupid things that happened were the manager (or someone who resembled a manager) just hovering around the buffet station. It made it uncomfortable for us. We felt like he was watching everything we were putting on our plate. He was sort of grumpy as well.
The other strange thing was that there were two people in the corner on their laptops. They appeared as though they worked there– maybe even the owners? They may have been computing numbers for the restaurant– who knows. They weren’t eating so I have to assume this to be the case. If so, that’s just unprofessional and so typically Indian. Doy our work out out of the sight of customers. Part of the dining experience is to NOT have to see ridiculous things like that. Finally, we noticed kitchen workers coming out of the kitchen and partaking in the food. They close at 2:30 and reopen at 5. Couldn’t the workers have waited until after we left? Is that REALLY the right thing to do here? The people that run Indian restaurants will never make sense to me.
Overall– a nicely appointed Indian restaurant with a sub-​par buffet line up and quirky management/​ownership habits.
Will we be back? Nah but if you’re going– prove us wrong.

Stopped by today for a weekday lunch buffet.
Good spread ranging from chicken tikka, Rogan josh, chicken briyani to a variety of vegetarian dishes. Naan, tandoori chicken, dosa and pagoda served at the table.
Everything was fresh and tasty.
Restaurant is spacious and airy.