Currylicious

This place was not that great, in a weird little spot, but the prices were decent. As I understand it, there’s new management now, so I’d be interested in returning. In general though there were many other Indian options in the area.

This place is horrible! First off I ordered a meal for delivery for $ 48.00 at 8pm. In bed watching TV, I fell asleep and they didn’t call me until 10:42pm!!! When I missed their call and called them back 10 min later– they never answered. The next morning I called– they told me that a manager would call me the following day. No one called. I called back a second time and said the manager was gone for an hour and would call me back. Of course– no call back. I called a third time and they said the same thing!!! Unbelievable. I wanted to go down to the place but I flew back to LA where I live. I got too busy to keep calling, and the manager NEVER made an effort to call me back. Horrible business ethics.
Now a month later my sister buys a grouping from them, we try and go three days ago and it’s «closed for the week». Awful awful business. My sister plans to report this business.

Today was the last day for a Groupon I had purchased for Currylicious months before, so we headed over for lunch. The place was pretty grim. Brightly colored walls and cushions, but the cushions were soiled in spots, and the floor of the restaurant was pretty dirty. The plastic covered menus were really sticky — ugh.
We ended up ordering wraps and asked if we could get them to go because I really did not want to eat there. You’re not supposed to be able to order to-​go with the Groupon, but the guy agreed since wraps are pretty portable.
I got a veggie wrap and my hons of hons husband got the Tikka Chicken wrap. My wrap had a couple of teaspoons of mushy, overcooked vegetables and the sauce made the naan it was wrapped in fall completely apart. I ate some of it with a fork, and it was nicely spiced, but I ended up tossing it in the compost bin. The tikka chicken wrap was a little better since it wasn’t as wett and again, nicely spiced with some real heat to it.
Overall, pretty grim. I wouldn’t waste your money or time here.

Couldn’t agree more with what Chelsea said.
This place use to easily be a 4 star establishment, but mediocre dishes and a lack of effort have bumped it down to a 2. The food is literally the definition of «meh». Flavorless, watered down curries, excessively greasy samosas, and Nann that is more bland than white bread.
The order that I made today included: 2 curries (medium spiced levels), samosas (with a request for plum sauce), a mango lassi, and a coke.
What I got: 2 half assed excuses for curries that were the definition of mild… pretty sure a baby could have successfully digested them, samosas sans plum sauce, no lassi, and a sprite.
I don’t really get how difficult it is to follow basic instructions. Why offer the option to have spicy levels or soda variations?! I get that they probably are super busy between takeout and dine in orders, but that is no excuse.
And I know that it all might sound catty… but when I spend money on food I expect my order to be correct.
Wouldn’t recommend this place unless you were literally on the verge of death from starvation or don’t have taste bud.

I would say in all honesty this is more of a 3 ½ star review as a restaurant but I’m giving it a 4 because the food was actually really good. I had the Dal Mahkani, a side of rice, and nann.
The restaurant is a little hole in the wall with funky colors and a fast food kind of feel. It’s really bright inside and a few of the tables are squeaky and misbalanced. There’s no real waiter service here – at least not this time of night. People are coming in and out ordering food to go as I sat and enjoyed my meal.
Overall, the food isn’t the problem. It’s actually the execution of this restaurant. It really does have so much potential if they have invested some time in redoing the décor, actually having waiters, dimming the lights, and just setting a different type of ambience for the consumer to enjoy.
Definitely not a place to take your date, but would recommend ordering takeout next time.

A few months ago I would have gladly given them 5, even 6 stars, but given their recent delivery service (or lack thereof) I’ve gotta bump it down to 3. Sorry, Currylicious.
The first few times I ordered from them they were swift and didn’t mess up the order, but recently it’s just been a drag. I’ve waited ~2 hrs for simple orders that they said would take 30 – 40 mins, and upon calling them they make shit up like «oh, your street is blocked off, the delivery man has to walk to your house on foot.» I ran outside to see WTF was going on – this is Oakland, after all — and nope, nothing. Like … why lie to me, only to deliver cold and mediocre food after all the drama?
If they weren’t one of the only Indian delivery places around here I’m not sure I’d order from them. Their food is OK but better Indian does, in fact, exist.

The delivery service is terrible. We’ve ordered delivery from here 3 times and on each occasion, my husband had to call multiple times to get an update on where the delivery person was. The last two times, it took 1−½ hours to get our food — we only live 4.5 miles from the restaurant, mind you. When the food arrived, it was cold, poorly prepared and missing condiments that we paid for in the order! You have to purchase at least $ 25 to qualify for delivery, but IMO the service and quality of food doesn’t match.
We’ve ordered from here several times because we are members of EAT24 and they’re one of the Indian restaurants recommended in the app. I’m done. After three disappointments, I’m moving on in hopes of a better experience.

UPDATE: Currylicious called after delivery and said that next time, because of the wait, we would get a free entrée.
This review is mostly about delivery time– which tonight exceeded levels of what is acceptable at 2 hours (!)
The food is actually pretty good, especially if you eat in. It can be rather flavorful and a lot of their new dishes are tasty.
Delivery though… this is what brings them down. I want Currylicious to stay in our neighborhood and to do well, but until they fix this chronically bad delivery system they have, I’m going to stop being a customer (for three years my housemate and I have ordered from them several times a month!)
For the past year they’ve gotten worse and worse, always citing «low staff» as the reason. First it was an hour, then an hour and a half, and tonight, two. That’s just beyond acceptable.
Curryliscious, step up!

I first went to Currylicious after moving to Oakland from SF. The (relative) quality and variety of Indian food in SF is pretty high, and I tried a number of underwhelming Indian places in the East Bay. Currylicious (CL) is a marked exception!
The flavor and consistency of the dishes I’ve had has had a pop that is absent in a lot of other places. If they had a lunch buffet, I’d be there every day. Every. Day.
The staff are also super nice. The dine-​in experience is spartan but always pleasant, and they have a BYOB policy you can’t really beat for a small, no-​frills restaurant.
Tell your friends, but only the cool ones!

Wandered in here for lunch takeout today. I ordered the tandoori chicken lunch special with ten minutes to go on my meter. The owner invited me to have some chai while I waited. I got my food and still had time for the walk back to the car.
The «three pieces of tandoori chicken» was three pieces from a kabob, but they were large. It came with a choice of vegetable curry and I chose the mixed veggie. RIce and naan rounded out the meal. I thought it was all good. Prepared quickly and well served. None of it was too spicy. I’ll be back.

What a terrible place in terms of service, communication and quality of food.
The price was right because we had a groupon but I would never go back and am glad I didn’t pay full price. There is no service but that was not clear until I asked for silverware because they only brought one set, no water or napkins. The old guy had to keep translating for the maybe 20 yr old who took order at register. I saw what looked like a large burrito and was a wrap so ordered it but ours arrived half the size with very hard dried out pieces of chicken. The tikka masala was four 1″ square pieces of chicken in sauce and mall portion of rice for $ 8! I was convinced it was mall servings due to the groupon and very disappointed. I have had better Indian food Everywhere I have eaten it!
The only good thing was we sat outside on a beautiful day.

The smell of Indian spices wafting out of the door was certainly inviting. I was meeting N for a catch-​up dinner here. I was early and started to go inside and wait for her at a table. I changed my mind and waited outside when I saw almost all of the tables still had dirty dishes on them.
We were able to find a table that did not have dirty dishes on it and sat down. We were brought menus and after deciding on what we wanted we waited and waited for the server to come back. He never did. It seems that you have to order at the cash register. I paid with cash and they did not have enough change. Everything at this spot is self-​service. One of the other customers got a water pitcher and filled out glasses before returning it to the man behind the counter.
The chicken marsala was reasonably priced. I suspect that’s because there were only a few pieces of chicken in the very creamy sauce. The rice was just okay.
The bathroom sink could have used a good scrubbing. When we left the dirty dishes were still on the tables.
One of my favorite Indian restaurants is almost directly across the street. I would rather go there the next time I want a bit of Indian food.

Holy shizz, this review is sooo overdue.
This goes to show how many drafted reviews I have in my queue, my goodness…
In any case, when I visited way back yonder, I thought the food and the service here was great. The setup is a bit strange, but it didn’t detract from the meal at all. I’m not sure how things are now though.
The MANGO LASSI, $ 2.99, is smooth, dense, and sweet. First time I had tried it, and I was glad I did :)
My friend and I each ordered a tikka masala and a naan (
). The large and crispy REGULAR NAAN will run you $ 1.49, whereas the scrumptious GARLIC NAAN will run you $ 2.49.
The $ 7.99 CHICKEN TIKKA MASALA (
) is a dish with boneless white-​meat cubes barbecued in a clay oven and cooked with tikka masala sauce. They mix in a stream of yogurt into the curry sauce, which is absolutely brilliant. The chicken wasn’t dry, but I definitely preferred my $ 9.99 LAMB TIKKA MASALA (
). Both tikka masala sauces were smooth and creamy, but the lamb was definitely more succulent and tender. Satisfying.
If I were to rank the Indian places I’ve eaten at (that are still open), it’d go:
1) Currylicious
2) Indian Flavors Express
3) Mount Everest Restaurant
4) House of Curries

I was in the mood for some chicken Tikka Masala, what I got was a diarrhea colored, soupy, bland, and watery tasting mess with what appeared to be chicken cubes floating in it. My brother also got something which he said he wouldn’t write home about. I wish my other place was open otherwise I would’ve ordered from there so this was our first time ordering from here (it was delivered). It literally took a few seconds just for the flavor of the food to register on my tongue because that’s how bland and watery it tasted. Gross. I brought the rest to my coworker who agreed that it was just somewhat spicy and flavorless.
Second of all, what kind of place serves curries with no rice? We got no rice! And didn’t see rice on the menu! Nobody eats Tikka Masala with no rice! So I had to make rice at 10:00 pm to accompany my curry!
The only reason why I’m giving it two stars was because the Coke was still cold and the garlic naan was good. Not trying this again though. I’ve learned my lesson.
For a place called Currylicious, their curry is sub par.

I came here for a to-​go order of lamb palak and veggie tikka masala with a side of naan. I really liked the food and the staff was very friendly.
I will definitely go back if I want to order Indian food close by, however it did take a good amount of time to get my food. Especially since I had called it in, I expected that I would go in and pay and it would be only a few minute wait. If you aren’t in a major hurry then you will love this place, but if you are make sure to tell them that you are in a hurry and I think they will be very accommodating.

Chicken Curry — Pretty good. Standard. Had better. People were complaining about the chicken pieces — mines had about 6 – 7 (from the chicken breast) pieces. Decent portion for one person. If it was for two people, it could be small portion but just enough.
Vegetable Pakora — Dry. Burnt. Not crispy. The look of it doesn’t look too appealing. Starchy. No veggies. Thought it would be different, that’s why I ordered it. Didn’t like it.
Had a $ 5 discount through Living Social. The prices weren’t that bad even without the discount. Ordered to go. Cute little restaurant. The guys were nice & greeted me upon picking up my order. Place was small & empty. Food was still hot when I got home. Asked for it to be spicy. Wasn’t spicy enough for me. Made some brown rice to go with the chicken curry. Filled me up.
It sounds like coming here for lunch is better based on the reviews? Maybe it is, but not dinner. I would not make my way to come back here again. I’ve experienced better that’s why I gave it a 2-​star. This was a last minute order since I was craving for some Indian curry food.

I came here with a friend on a weekday for lunch at around 1pm, and there were not a lot of people there so we were able to order and sit down immediately. I ordered one of the curry lunch specials.
Food took a little bit of time to arrive, but the portions were surprisingly large! It also came with Naan. I enjoyed the curry, rice, and chicken I had, and took the leftovers home. We also packed up the Naan and it smelled so good that my friend’s dog jumped on the table and ate it all when we were not looking.
Even though the service was a little lacking, the food was pretty great and for a large portion and decent price. I would come here again and recommend it to others.

Currylicious is a small Naan & Curry style spot where you order at the counter, grab your own silverware, water, and chai and they deliver your food when ready. We came for lunch and ordered paneer tikka masala, one of the chalkboard specials (chicken, fenugreek, and coconut curry), and a plain & garlic naan.
It took about 10 – 15 minutes for our food to arrive which seemed a little slow given we were the first customers of the day.
The paneer tikka masala was skimpy with just 5 cheese cubes in the sauce with a touch of cream (
). The flavor was odd; it was not tomato-​y and very sweet. I don’t know if they had a pumpkin curry on the menu, but that’s what I though of when I tasted it. Maybe the cook scooped from the wrong orange sauce?
The chicken curry was very good. A much more substantial serving of protein (
) and a medium spicy kick to it. Strong flavors in contrast to the tikka masala.
The naan were fine. Chewy with a nice char. Is cilantro a garlic naan standard now? (
)
Chicken curry: 4+ stars
Paneer Tikka Masala: 2 stars
Naan: 3.5 stars

I’ve never had BAD Indian food and I’m not about to start now. love love LOVE this place… except for the miniature sized meat portions that would only satisfy someone like my 1-​year-​old.
I’m not an Indian Food expert but I really liked this place… Their chicken with rice lunch special was YUMMMMOOOOO. A total party of spices for my palate. I ate all the meat, potatoes (and I hate veggies) and even killed the cauliflower. Nothing could stop me. I was waiting for the heartburn but it never came! SCORE!
The next day I went back and decided to try another dish on their lunch menu. Yes yes I know, when I really like something I’ll keep going there until I play it out. 2^nd dish, not so good. It was the chicken tikki marsala with rice. Um, THREE PIECES OF CHICKEN? ARE YOU JOKING?
As if that didnt turn me off enough, when i tasted it, it just didn’t hit me where I wanted it to. Maybe I’ll stick to what I ordered the first day. But the prices aren’t that bad ($ 8 for lunch), the guys there are really nice, and there’s free chai (which I discovered the second day because no one offered it to me on the first day)…
Anyhow, that’s all for this report. Toodles.

Meh.