New Saffron

Decent buffet, but closed.
Used to be the Southern Spice at one point.
You win some and you lose some.

The Background:
A 3.5 restaurant, I personally wouldn’t make this a place where I come often due to the fact that its too spicy and it doesn’t have one dish in which it excels even though it does have a few good dishes.
The Positives:
Unlike most other buffets, Indian or otherwise, this price includes drinks which is nice. Additionally, this place has a dinner buffet on the weekends which is nice when you are craving Indian food. The wait staff was also pretty quick on refilling drinks.
The Negatives:
While there were a wide range of dishes that were good, there wasn’t any that really stood out. Additionally, the food was all really spicy which I didn’t appreciate but my friend loved.

Came in for dinner buffet.
Buffet is very limited and has basic choices for veg and non-​veg. Their Chicken Tikka Masala (butter chicken) was the best choice from the buffet. Very smooth and tasty. Lamb was ok too and few other chicken dishes were decent. Only bad dish was their Tandoori chicken which was garbage.
It was ok. I probably won’t go back unless I am desperate for Indian food.
2.5 stars

They are pretty good. We got the dinner buffet, which was a pretty good deal, although it is difficult to not overeat (I left stuffed and waddling). I tried all the dishes, however, only two dishes really stood out to me. The paneer curry dish (I forgot what it was called) had the best flavor, and the chicken tikka dish – but not exactly. What ended up being addicting was mixing the paneer curry minus the paneer + the chicken from the chicken tikka minus the sauce. All over the basmati rice. Yum: D.
The samosa was ok, but very greasy…
Also their oranges and lemons were very sweet and juicy.

Their lunch buffet is only $ 9.99 per person, even on weekends. It’s a bit less crowded than Amber on weekends, so you don’t have to wait for an hour to be seated. Overall, the food has a bit more kick and is spicier than at some of the other local Indian buffets.
The spread is pretty big, with a lot of desi Chinese/​Indian items like noodles, chili chicken, and green beans. They offered maybe 15 or so dishes that particular day. They had the standards: basamati rice, what appeared to be a vegetable biryani (flavor/​texture were off), pakora in curry, samosas (better fresh, though), daal, vegetable vindaloo, chicken tikka masala (thigh meat), vegetable korma (too creamy), palak paneer, and some others.
They also had the sweet carrot dessert, and kheer that used shorter grain rice, which I liked. The side area also had the standard chutneys, cucumbers, salad, oranges. There’s also complimentary tea, which was just so-​so.
The best part was the fluffy naan, which was just slightly buttered and so fresh. I hear the garlic naan and shrimp curry off the regular menu are amazing. The lunch buffet wasn’t bad — uncrowded, quick service, and a good variety at a good price.

Dude the buffet (in the afternoon) at New Saffron is great. It’s like ~$ 9 excluding tip, and you get unlimited indian food that is of pretty good quality. Samosas, naan, and chicken curry are my personal favs.
The only downside is it’s easy to eat way too much :)

I actually wasn’t too impressed with New Saffron. Came here per Unilocal recommendation (of course. I don’t think I ever go anywhere anymore without first checking Unilocal!). I had the buffet. and found nothing special. Maybe I’m missing something? Or maybe I’m just not an Indian food connoisseur?
The atmosphere wasn’t anything special either. So, unfortunately, I probably won’t be back. :(

Our dinner here was good. The buffet had a nice mix of veggie and meat dishes; but for a vegetarian like me I would have loves to see more veggie dishes of course. Naan was great; 12.95 for dinner buffet… I guess I feel like the cost is higher because of the meat! All the veggie dishes were very yummy… Palak was spicy. mmm. Tried the buffet for lunch once also– desserts were goood.

This review is for the lunch buffet.
The place is clean and the selection is very good compared to other Indian buffets which only serve about 4 meat dishes and a number of vegetarian ones. This buffet has a little over 10 meat dishes comprised of lots of chicken and one lamb dish.
The service is great — frequent top-​offs of water and fresh naan almost as soon as you sit down. The naan is a good combination of crispy and chewy — yum!
Since I don’t know the exact names of Indian dishes this review will be a comparison of other Indian buffet places and dedicated non-​buffet Indian places like the excellent Shalimar.
Like most other Indian buffets, the spice and flavoring level in their dishes is less than that of non-​buffet places. This can be a very good thing if you can’t handle the really in your face flavor of the latter, especially in copious amounts as you would get at a buffet. I know that if I were presented with a buffet of Shalimar– or Pakwan– level foods I wouldn’t be able to handle it too well nor eat as much. But despite this, this buffet certainly isn’t lacking in flavor. Everything is at least exactly as it should be for an Indian buffet with the extended selection, service, and freshness bumping it up a notch.
I don’t think you will be disappointed by this Indian buffet as long as you go in knowing what level of Indian food you should be expecting.

Even though we usually go to Darbar, we decided to pop into New Saffron just to check out the competition. Not so great. Huge place with interesting folk art, but the food wasn’t really up to par. Lunch buffet had the standards (palak paneer, butter chicken, etc.), but there was also weird renditions of bad Chinese food. One dish, Chicken-​65, was stringy meat fried and then coated in red «fun» sauce. Another one was watery noodle stir-​fry. Tepid and tasteless. Butter chicken was fine, but it’s hard to mess up protein in fat juice. Desserts were a slight bump just for the novelty of having carrot halva. Gulab jamun was nicely done, and the kheer (rice pudding) wasn’t half bad. Chai was ridiculously watery and off-​tasting though. I did like the fresh hot naan that they bring to your table, but hey, Darbar does the same AND cooks better food. *snap*

We decided to try out a new place and they had a buffet so why not! But the food was just ok. They had Tandoori chicken, chicken tikki, lamb, vegetable samosa, tons of chicken dishes but it just tasted bland to me. They could use more variety of choices on dishes. I was not wowed at all. The guy brought us our water very quickly but the place was a bit boring with just bright colored walls and tired looking furniture. Naan was very tasty and gave us some huge pieces. The Keer rice dessert was not bad and reminded me of rice pudding. Price was ok at $ 13.95 a person. The lamb dish was the only spicy dish they had. I think if you wants tons of food that just tasted ok go here otherwise go to Passage from India down the road.

I liked it.
I think I liked it too much that I ate too much of the buffet.
I was expecting the tandoori chicken to be dry but it wasn’t. Timing perhaps? I came on a dinner buffet at 8pm so maybe they just came out with a fresh batch. The garlic Naan is fresh too. I like dipping it into whatever curry I’m trying out. I had 4 Samosas here, some wild rice and curry chicken, some lamb, some vegetable noodles…
Let’s just say I was pretty satisfied from all the food and I ended up needing to head home immediately to digest them properly.
I would definitely try this place again, maybe during the daytime. Too much good food here and it’s nice to walk outside after a heavy meal.
The service was great, the waiters immediately pull off your plate as soon as you’re done and ready for a 2^nd shot at that buffet.

Went here with a bunch of SBC Unilocalers for the lunch buffet on Wednesday.
Restaurant is attached to a hotel on El Camino Real — ample parking, quite easy to get to and easy to identify — large signage.
We were eight in the party — I had called ahead to see if we could get a side room — they said they prefer to save it for only when they are full or if the party had over 20 people. Mildly disappointed but no biggie — we were seated quickly and did enjoy a bit of privacy for our group (which I’m sure the other diners appreciated hahaha)
Typical to slightly meh ambiance — a little worn looking and quite uninspiring. But we were here with one purpose — the food! So, no stars taken away for the slightly industrial atmosphere — except for a high pitched construction drill next door that sounded like Dr. Demento on crack performing complicated dental surgery on someone with titanium teeth!!! Dude, maintain!
~ 3 stars for location and ambiance
Shout-​outs to Walter P., Michael L., James G., Tetsu N., Ryan O., Betty N. and Michael C. — thanks for showing up to this impromptu event and taking time out of your work days!
~ 5 stars for SBC!!! Yay!
We didn’t waste any time getting to the food. The buffet is laid out conveniently, with two lines of attack possible. The salad and healthy stuff (largely ignored by our team) is located on a separate island. The main buffet station is separated into two sections — one with vegetarian options and the other with real food, er, the chicken and meat options =)
~ 5 stars for food layout and organization
Here goes (largely from memory and helped by a James G. photo — thanks James!!)
Vegetarian options
— Rice — Passed
— Veg biryani (rice dish with vegetables and spices) — Yum, 4 stars
— Dal (lentil soup) — Passed
— Alu-​gobi (potatoes with cauliflower) — 3 stars, good!
— Navratan korma (vegetables and nuts in a creamy sauce) — 3 stars
— Matar paneer (peas and paneer in a curry/​cumin sauce) — Passed
— Palak (spinach — no paneer — NOTE) — Passed
— Black lentil dal — Passed
— Malai kofta (vegetable dumplings in creamy sauce) — 3 stars
— Curried fried potatoes and onions — 4 stars — nice and crispy!
— Chana masala (chick peas in a rich tomato based sauce) — Passed
Non-​vegetarian options
— Chicken tikka masala — 3 stars
— Chili chicken (spicy, with peppers) — 4 stars
— Tandoori chicken — Passed
— 3 other chicken dishes (forget names) — collective 3 stars
— Fish pakora (breaded fish tenders) — 3 stars
— Bread pakora (bread with potatoes and spices in batter and deep fried — 3 stars
— Lamb curry (spicy) — 3 stars
— Indian style egg noodles (must try this if you haven’t!) — 3 stars
On a separate table, they had the tandoori chicken, and some miscellaneous south Indian dishes
— Upma (a semolina based dish) — Passed
— Idli (steamed rice dumplings) — Passed
— Sambar (lentil based soup) — Passed
— Rasam (another soup, thinner consistency and more spiced than sambar) — Passed
Desserts
— Gulab jamun (kinda look like hush puppies — deep fried dough balls in sugar syrup) — Passed
— Kheer (a rice based mild dessert, creamy looking, with raisins and cashes) — Passed
— Carrot halwa (made from grated carrots and condensed milk) — 3 stars (my mom makes te BEST carrot halwa!!!)
Hot chai — 4 stars!
All for $ 9.95 including taxes. What a deal!
And that was the end of any attempt at productivity for the rest of the day hahaha
Thanks again everybody who made it — can’t wait to do it again (some other place perhaps!!!)
3 stars overall
# 50

2.5 stars.
How on Earth does this place get more than 3 stars is beyond me.
Badri set up a lunch meet with some Unilocalers and we had good lunch conversations but not good lunch food.
The tandoori chicken was dry, the bell peppers and the sliced onions (if not drowned in curry) were dry, and the cauliflower sprinkled heavily with cumin powder was dry.
The ambiance was dreary. .. we kept hearing a «drilling dentist» noise (and no, Tetsu, it was not termites mating) throughout lunch and the cheesy Bollywood videos were quite distracting.
+1 star for buffet with plenty of chicken choices
+1 star for $ 9.95
+0.5 star for refilling my glass of water
I was told Amber down the street is much better.
Oh well.

I went for a large group dinner, and we had an entire side room to ourselves. It was a Thursday night at around 7, but other than our room there were only two or three other tables with customers, which was weird.
I ordered the non-​vegetarian Thali, which is basically a variety sampling. Good Decision. It came with a lamb samosa, pankora (from what I could tell, just fried breading), and papad (be careful, it’s spicy but it doesn’t hit you til later) as appetizers. Then, they bring out this platter with small metal bowls; I really liked the presentation. You get a bowl of: rice, butter chicken (my favorite of the entrees), lamb curry, malai kofta (my least favorite) lentils, yogurt, and kheer for dessert. The kheer was mushy rice bits in a creamy/​syrupy liquid. I didn’t like it.
The service was excellent, especially considering we were a group of about 30. I would definitely come back.

This review is for the lunch buffet only.
PARKING: Plentiful
SETTING: Clean and attractive with nice color scheme (yes, Saffron included). I was surprised at the large size of the buffet. It rivals the size of Grand Indian Buffet or Bombay Garden.
SERVICE: Good. Waters were refilled regularly and the bill/​cash exchange was painless
FOOD: Here’s what I’ve tried so far
– Naan: delivered fresh to the table. Top notch. A great combo of chewy and crispy
– Fish pakora: never had these before. Quite good
– Dal Mahkani: Very good
– Pakora curry: not as good as the version at Kabob and Curries, but damn tasty. Probably the best item on my first visit.
– Chicken curry: Just OK; nothing special
– Chana Masala: On the thin side and surprisingly bland and flavor-​free. Disappointing overall.
– Palak: Very tasty, though I would have liked paneer inside
– Aloo gobi: Pretty standard but slightly bland
– Chicken Tikka Masala: Nothing special
– Aloo fry: fied potates and onions; very bland and unexciting
– yellow Dal (name?): Just OK; on the bland side.
Overall I would describe the food as very fresh, but under-​spiced.
Total for lunch buffet was $ 9.95, a good price. With tax and tip this ended up being around $ 12 for me.
Yet another in a long line of decent (but not outstanding) Indian buffets. Not a bad thing, mind you. As usual, I am grading on a curve.

Yummy Spicy Indian Food
I was here as a guest last night attending an Ivy League event which equalled being surrounded by 65 intellectual orbs that made the room even brighter. All of a sudden, my brain began to swell: with all the brains here from Google/​Pixar/​Adobe it was only through osmosis that I felt realigned with reality.
Our food was served buffet style, with several roasting pans filled with good Northern and Southern Indian cuisine. Prior to the main entrees, I sampled the vegetarian samosa accompanied with a mild cilantro chutney and tamarind relish. The samosa was amazingly light (usually the stuffing is a little dense for my oil-​avoiding butt) and not too greasy. I skipped the vegetable pakora but the eggplant did look enticing.
Next were the entrees and the chicken tikka masala and chicken kadai is where I was in love. Never mind that the other dinner guest became slightly red after the chilis hit his palate. I was taking sips of water in between bites, but the savory flavor and spices were too hard to ignore. I continued on this masochistic behavior and ate the entire amount. The naan was fresh/​warm and it alleviated the spiciness. Only slightly, of course. The basmati rice was done al dente style and easy to mix with the masala sauce. With Indian food I usually poke my fork around until it comes matched with several items. For example, a forkful of chicken tikka dipped in the tamarind sauce that I then tap into the basmati rice and there is one mouthful. The chicken vindaloo was also very pleasing to my already burning mouth. It was alleviated by the yogurt dressing for the salad, which I drizzled over my rice in anticipation of oncoming chili attacks.
The desserts were the EMTs on site, although I’m not one to munch away on the gulab jamoons, which my friend described rather eloquently as «sweet drenched fried little cheese balls». I did, however, find the kheer quite refreshing, as it smothered the flames from the previous entrees and I ended up eating two little bowls of the delightful sweet dairy first aid kit.
The waiters were most attentive, taking away plates the minute our forks hit the surface. Our water was kept full as was the serving pans. We were seated in the large events room which kept our 65+ party well spaced and lots of room to mingle and communicate. The other rooms were also quite large… I can foresee rentals/​events taking up positions in the near future.
For a good Indian catering, I’d come back to New Saffron anytime to fill my cravings for a good kick in the mouth variety of their chicken tikka.

Attentive Waiters, Light Airy Naan and a Great Deal for Hungry Lunchers
Rockin lunch buffet at $ 10 per person all you can eat selection which included Chicken Tiki Masala, String Beans, Seasoned Rice, curry cauliflower and many more. Numerous baskets of hot fluffy Naan bread is delivered to your table. Arriving at prime lunch hour, there was plenty of seating so we got to hit the buffet right away. Waiters gave excellent service, refilling water, bringing drinks and Naan to our table very quickly and before you had to ask. They don’t rush you off your table, so when your ready to go you walk over to the front register to pay. A great deal for a lot of satisfying food for a great price.

Two words. DINNER BUFFET. Where have you been all my adult life? $ 12.95. All you can eat Indian food goodness. For vegetarians and carnivores alike.
Also, no gnats. A plus.
My go-​to Indian restaurant now, better than its counterpart Darbar.

This is a new restaurant that is in the spot where Southern Spice used to be. I came here on their opening day so obviously the restaurant was not 100% yet.
The interior needs serious work. There are many parts of the ceiling and walls which are falling apart. The floor has a lot of holes and missing tiles, a dangerous thing to have in any public place.
I came for the lunch buffet. Service was OK except that no one ever took a drink order. The person who seated me didn’t ask if I want a drink and didn’t give me water. I had to wait a few minutes for the server to come around and fill everyone’s water.
Naan is served fresh to your table, the way it should be, not made in bulk and left on the buffet to get stale. Bonus points for doing naan correctly.
The lunch buffet has a decent selection for a small restaurant. I had the vegetable pakora appetizer, Saffron rice, Chicken Vindaloo, and a spinach dish (Palak Paneer?)
The pakoras tasted ok but they were not fried correctly, they were kinda mushy on the outside. I usually get these fried and crunchy.
The saffron rice either wasn’t cooked correctly or it was made with the incorrect kind of rice. It came out sticky and kind of mushy. The rice I expect at Indian restaurants is firm and the grains are separated, not sticky.
The spinach dish which I think was palak paneer was not good. It was lacking in good Indian spice and it had too much tomato taste. I only had a little bit of it.
The chicken vindaloo dish was ok but still not that good. It was bland and had overbearing tomato taste. In my own Indian cooking, one of the challenges I face is getting the correct balance of tomato. I try to use just enough tomato taste to enhance and compliment the flavor of the Indian spices. If I use too much, then the tomato taste will mask the Indian spices and all you taste is tomato. This is how their dishes tasted to me, too much tomato taste and no Indian spice flavor.
Since this was their first day, I hope that their cooking, service, and interior will improve. I will check back in a few weeks and see how they’re doing. Right now the most I can give is two stars and I would not recommend this restaurant to friends.