Raj Darbar

The food was very solid compared to other Indian restaurants and and the service was very attentive. I had the tikka chicken, palak paneer and chicken jaferzie. All were delicious. The husband and I had leftovers and we were stuffed.

Been to this place couple times last year. Came back tonight with a groupon. Food was ok, temperature not hot enough. But worse was there were multiple cockroaches on the wall crawling, on a cold winter day! Also saw one on our tablecloth, and one on my booth. Walked around and saw more cockroaches on another booth.
Will not be coming back. Sanitation a major issue.

I ordered delivery from Raj Darbar. It took a little bit over an hour to deliver under a mile, but no issue other than that. I got vegetable samosas and vegetable biriyani. I read from other reviews that the samosas are huge, but they seemed average. They were good, nonetheless. The biriyani was quite wet without much flavor. It wasn’t bad, necessarily, but you couldn’t really distinguish the vegetables by taste. Overall nothing was outright bad, but nothing was outright good.

Absolutely terrible service. Waiter came back after 25 minutes bc he forgot to put in our order and needed to retake our order! Their was only 1 waiter on a night we bought a groupon and he stopped at our table 3 times all night. Every time he walks by he had his head the other direction like he’s avoiding me!

I have been eating here for years and the food is consistently delicious. Breads are warm and fresh. Dals are spicy and fresh. This beats anything on Devon street

Bought the Groupon deal ($ 13 for $ 20 worth of food) and shared the Darbar Platter with my fiancé. Very generous portions, and food was ready within a half hour. I would’ve given this place 5 stars had they considered my note on Groupon and my phone call shortly after placing the order. I specifically asked for «very spicy» and it was not spicy at all. My fiancé is Caucasian and even he said it wasn’t spicy. Next time I will make sure to ask for «Indian-​level spicy» so my food has a kick to it.

Food is horrible. And service is even worse. No coordination what so ever. Food is full of grease and also found hair like thing on it. Lamb curry tasted good but lamb itself was not fresh.
As an Indian, I feel offended and ashamed of such food being served. Save your money go to Tandoor char house next door or royal India grill on clark is better. Just saying.

I don’t understand why this place is not well rated. We enjoyed everything we ordered. We got the beef samosas, saag gosht, lamb vindaloo, and garlic naan. We were pleased with the food. As for price, these prices are not bad. We have been to other places like India House downtown and Hema’s kitchen and these prices are comparable. We’d come back.

Shittiest customer service in Chicago. I have been having food from Raj Darbar for few years now. Recently it seems that people working in restaurant have changed. I ordered one mattar paneer, and dal makhani, and reminded waiter to send me some onion/​lime instead of rice. They send me ta’mattar’ panner instead of mattar panner, and i gave them a call to let them know that they have misread my order. They started defending themselves, and the guy on the phone let me know that ‘he cannot remember all the orders people give to him’. When i asked him to repeat my order, he was rude, and let me know that mistake is on my side. This is not the first time i have had experience with this restaurant in last few weeks. I am sure this is going to be last time i would be ordering food from them.
In the past i was sent chicken curry (messed up my order), and was the last order for the day, and then defended they have sent me the right curry (i am a vegetarian) and they cannot do anything about it.
Owner — are you hearing this? If you are not thinking to take your customers seriously, you would loose many customers to your restaurant. I have tried reaching out to you many times in past, but guys at phone doesnt let me talk to you.
Beware of parcel orders, I am seriously reconsidering this place for something else.

Delicious food but a scary encounter. We were just about to receive our entrée but realized there was a large bug on the wall next to our booth. The bug closely resembled a cockroach. The server saw us frantically moving in our seats and offered to move us to a different table. The bug kept scurrying across the wall thought our entire meal with no hesitation from the staff. Our server took $ 20 off of the bill.

I am incredibly sad to be moving out of the delivery zone for this joint.
No more piping hot samosas, chicken vindaloo, baigan masala, garlic naan, and chicken pakora on our regular scheduled week-​night programming. This, hands down, is the best Indian takeout/​delivery place in East Lakeview.
(Pro-​tip: if you like spice, be sure to ask them to kick it up a notch or two. Default settings are a bit low in my opinion.)

Definitely try appetizer sampler to start! This little restaurant has it all… Great food down to nicely cut white meat and fresh shrimp, nice portions, good ambiance, reasonable prices, and BYOB makes this spot a great date place for Indian food.

Came in on a Thursday night to use a groupon deal, glad we did. The reviews seemed mixed, but I don’t really have any complaints about the food nor service. We significantly over ordered unknowing the large portions we would get. Between the two of us, we took down some garlic naan, two soups, a cheese, chicken and lamb dish. All very good, all things I would get again.
I haven’t had much Indian food in Chicago, but this is my front-​runner thus far.

Pretty damn good! If it’s any indication, I’ve ordered delivery from here 3 times just in the past two weeks.
This place is pretty close to «authentic» Indian food. My go to order is the Paneer Makhani. The flavor is on point — it’s sweet but spicy at the same time. The curry is creamy but not overly thick and heavy. They don’t skimp on the paneer pieces and overall, the quantity is huge (easily enough for 2 people). This would have easily been 5 stars if it wasn’t for the Naan. Their naan is mediocre. I wouldn’t say it’s horrible — definitely edible — but it’s not the fluffy goodness you’d expect.
One other great thing about this place — fast delivery. They always arrive in 30 – 40 mins. Overall, you can’t really go wrong with this place if you’re in the mood for Indian.

Excellent food! All the «food» reviews were spot on! We had the Chicken Masala and the spicy Lamb. The beef samosas were also a treat. You must accompany your meal with the garlic naan. I will say the service complaints were unfounded. Our service was great! Also the restaurant interior is way better than the photos show.
Oh by the way BYOB!
A great experience!
Thank you!

I have RAVED about this place and they disappointed me in a major way.
I ordered my usual: chana masala, naan, and vegetable samosas. A few hours later I’m woken out of my sleep by the need to vomit. Yes, food poisoning.
I’m on the fence about coming back because this was the first time (and hopefully last…) time this has happened. I’m trying to get in touch with a manager to see if I can get a refund.

So having come back only for a friend’s party, the place was still pretty empty with only a handful of tables occupied.
However, I was much more impressed with the food this time. You definitely have to know what to order. The traditional and popular chicken tikka masala is just very subpar here, along with their chicken vindaloo, which is disappointing, as these are staples.
This time around, I had the matar paneer. This was super tasty and I had it spicy, and it was actually spicy, unlike the vindaloo I had last time. I feel like last time, our food came out so fast, in which they likely just reheated the food. This time, everything was much more fresh. The bf had the boti kebab and it was very good. Perfectly cooked and juicy tender chicken with a good balance of flavors. We also tried the garlic naan, and while I’ve had softer, warmer, flakier naan, the garlic flavor was present, which can be lacking at other places.
Service was alright. They are friendly and accommodating. However, they don’t come by too frequently, and when they do, they never even cleared out any of our empty plates.
Am pleased that there are good dishes here, but still wouldn’t come back, unless I had to. Still just average to me, especially as the prices aren’t exactly cheap.

Was hear again a few days ago with a few friends. Food was even better this last time. We had the mixed platter for appetizers which was really tasty and about 8 large pieces. It was very filling. There naan bread was deelish!!! Especially the potato naan!!! That was my favorite. We had the eggplant dish in the veggie section… also really good. The staff was super nice and we closed the place down and kept them there a little late but they weren’t rude about it. :) AND ITS BYOB!!! They also have a full bar so that’s convenient.
I highly recommend raj darbar, again.

We have been ordering in from here lately and really like their matar paneer as well as the naan. Their quantities are really generous so we can easily make 2 – 3 meals out of a 2-​person order and they send rice with each entrée, so that helps too!

I had a groupon-​like voucher that expires soon, so I took myself to dinner at Raj Darbar tonight. I will not be returning. The experience was, in a word, disappointing.
The good: the server who took my order and brought out my food was pleasant.
The rest: the food itself was underwhelming. I started with the sheekh kebab and though it looked good when it came out, the lamb was overcooked and under-​seasoned. Then, I followed up with saag gosht. The entrée actually wasn’t bad — it was not good either, but I didn’t have major problems with it (though I asked for it to be spicy and it was not. I guess words like spicy are subject to one’s interpretation). The naan also was fine though not as fluffy as at other places like Tandoor, Rangoli, etc.
But here’s the kicker, when it came time for the bill I paid in cash and asked to have a specific denomination brought back to me. For reasons that are not clear, the gentleman who took the bill decided that he would not bring back what I requested. Instead, after keeping me waiting for some time, this guy handed me a bunch of one-​dollar bills minus the amount that I owed. For future reference to him and/​or the owners, that’s insulting. I was already not planning to make a second visit because the food is not as good as others, but the added insult to injury sealed the deal.