Saravana Bhavan

Used to be awesome, but it’s closed permanantly, so kind of hard to rate it higher than 1 star.

This is vegetarian restaurant, so if you want lamb or chicken in your dish, go elsewhere. The way you eat here is dosa (thin-​crêpe) dipped in various chutney mixtures, sambar over rice, and rasam soup. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. They want you to have a good dining experience. Be careful on the spice as hot mean hot for a person from southern India, not hot for a typical America.

I have to ding this place. I grew up in Madras in India the home of Sarvana Bhavan and this place does not do justice. The standard fare was standard. The dosa I got was too baking-​soda-​y and the sambar was weird and sweet. However, all three stars go to their Pongal. It was the best I have ever had in this country and for that alone I returned there thrice!

Nothing can beat Sharavan bhavan when it comes to South Indian Veg food. But do remeber South Indian Veg food is not always healthy– most items are ffried but very tasty. For some reason this place in Orlando is not crowded compared to those in Sunnyvale, Boston and Atlanta. ?I have been to all of them

Food was excellent. In a city of overpriced tourist restaurants this was a welcome meal. My 8 year old loved it. My only complaint was the cleanliness. My original glass was dirty and the trash cans were overflowing. Also, our second pitcher of water was warm. That being said I would definitely go back.

Pretty decent food and good staff! Makes me visit often here. Compared to sarvana bhavan in Sunnyvale CA, this is far far good!

We were on vacation in Orlando and were looking for excellent, vegan Indian food for take out. We found it here! Good food, friendly staff, and very reasonable prices.
Great dosa, channa masala, roti. I think I ordered aloo gobi, but instead I got separate containers of potato and cauliflower dishes. They were delicious.
I like very spicy Indian food. I asked for it «Indian hot, not Florida hot» and I got just what I wanted: spicy and flavorful. It was ready quickly. The whole experience was fast, friendly and trouble-​free.
I don’t usually eat at chain restaurants, but this one was definitely exceptional. I’ll look for other Saravana Bhavans whenever I travel.

Excellent food… we had special thali, choler with puri, idli and doses. The sambhar is authentic south Indian and the chokes awesome. I am from boston and I hope they open a restaurant there soon.

Just when I though all South Indian cuisine in Orlando was garden variety, along comes Saravana Bhavan. It’s too bad this place is a chain, but I am glad to see any place set the bar higher. I’ve tried all of the other South Indian places rated 4 stars or better on Unilocal prior to this one, and each time I have left a bit unsatisfied for one reason or another. South Indian seems to be exploding in Orlando right now, but most has only been good… not what I would call great. Saravana Bhavan is well beyond that. These flavors are more complex, clearly the hand of a skilled professional. That turned out to be true as the waitress told us the chef has been in the business 20 years. Everything we ordered was awesome. The Poori was the best I have ever had, hands down. That was due in no small part to the pair of unique sides that came with it. Definitely order this. The Mysora Masala Dosa was also excellent. Very spicy, but there are plenty of less spicy dosas available. Dosas are one dish that I have had some really good examples of in Orlando, however the trio of dips were a cut above the other options in town. The last thing was the Vegetable Uthappam. We had never had this before, but it is a new favorite. A fried rice and lentil pancake with vegetables inside. Loads of flavor and those same great dipping sauces as the dosa. I highly recommend getting one of these!
I must also call attention to another plus to this place: it is extremely clean and modern inside. It also has an open kitchen… a rarity for this cuisine, at least in my experience. I guess it is too late for me to not over-​hype this place, but I really think it delivers.

I recently bought a Groupon for this place and tried their food for the first time. Now, I wish I had bought 10 more Groupons because I know I will keep going back.
The place is very clean. I can’t say the service was really fast, but it was pretty good considering how busy the place was the day that I went.
The main draw for me was the food– it was some of the best Indian food I have ever had. Perfectly seasoned, not too oily, and lots of variety. Definitely recommend it.

One of the main reasons of visiting Saravana Bhavan was that we are pure vegetarians and it very difficult to find good vegetarian food in the US except for cold salads. Also, we need to customize the food as my wife and sister in law don’t eat onion or garlic.
We ate here on the 14^th of June 2011 and we had a nice time. The food tasted authentic tamilian with great Rasam Vada. The waiters were very humble and respectful. They helped us customize the order and the dosas are cooked in front of the customers in an open cooking area. Music was A R Rahman tracks mostly.
Smetimes you feel like tipping the waiters from your heart (& wallets!),
this was one of those meals.
Go for great, simple and authentic south Indian food and filter coffee better than anything Starbucks can brew up.

Good south Indian food. We gobbled on pretty much everything since everything looked (and was) tasty.
The coffee was really a taste of «taste of south India». the vadas and the dosas were amazing. The only slightly irritating thing was that the waiters tend to get a bit confused when they have too many customers. The waiter in fact forgot our order and came back to ask for it again. But, the food made up for it. And hey… Everyone makes mistakes :)
Overall, a must go!

I am south Indian and have had many dosa’s in India. This was the best i’ve had in America. It was suprisingly clean and was nice inside. They had a sink outside the bathroom which really reminded me of india. They had different types of chutneys which is not seen at other orlando dosa places. I wish they had placed it on sandlake.

For as long as I can remember, French cuisine has been my favorite international food. But I’ve only found one top-​notch French restaurant in Orlando (Le Coq au Vin). Now, Indian is making its way to the top of my list, as Orlando seems to be getting more and more excellent Indian restaurants. I have so many favorites, that I no longer have a favorite.
Today I went to Saravana Bhavan. It’s a chain, but we are lucky to be one of only five cities in the US, and two in Canada, with this excellent Indian vegetarian chain. The others are scattered about in the UK, France, Singapore, Bahrain, Malaysia and Dubai. The focus is on South Indian cuisine.
I began with a starter of two idlys, South Indian steamed rice and lentil patties, served with a chutney and three other sauces of varying degrees of heat. Then I proceeded to the main course, a gigantic Onion Rava Dosa, served with what I believed were the same chutney and sauces. This large, rectangular thin crêpe was made from cream of wheat and sprinkled with onion, then fried to a just-​right crispness.
The number of dosa dishes is huge, as is another South Indian dish, uthappam, a rice lentil pancake.
For dessert, I had to leave the recommendation to my beautiful waitress, as there was no description of the four desserts available. She suggested Gulab Jamun, two sweet hot donuts, moist and savory. They were a little too sweet for my taste, but still quite good.
I hope they will make it in this former location of India 4 U, which is an area that isn’t frequented by much traffic. All of the other diners were Indian, so I’m hopeful they at least will be able to keep it afloat.