Madras Cafe

Don’t go for the buffet. You can’t cross a single plate. I think they add some ingredient that makes your stomach feel filled but not. Deceived!

Pretty standard restaurant South Indian fare. I was super excited just to find a South Indian restaurant in San Diego at all, let alone one that is super cheap and vegetarian.
The pongal and paper masala dosa were my favorites of what I ordered. The coffee was good too. Excited to try the poori and rice dishes.
The chutney and sambhar were not amazing, but pretty standard for restaurant food (coconut chutney is a little watery, sambhar isn’t spicy), but definitely at least average in my opinion, not below.

i liked the buffet!
i know something about south indian food since i lived there for a while. i thought the sambar and idly was very good. the dosa was good but maybe a little underseasoned. i loved the fried onions! like onion rings indian style. the curries were good too.
for $ 9 it’s a great deal. also, it is not super fatty like punjab/​mainstream food though you can easily pack on the calories with all the CARBS. the salad helps.

This is the place for dosas or thalis. Dosas at any other Indian restaurant are simply sad. I happily make the more than 20 min trek to Madras Café for dosas.
I have been going here since about 2008. I always get the madras dosa (because it is non-​spicy), or the madras thali (if I’m lucky enough to make it there tuesday-​thursday). If you can, I recommend the thali. It comes with soooo much food. The dosa is actually the appetizer. It’s a little smaller than the regular dosas because you will have a lot of food coming later. The meal is a metal tray full of curries, sambar (dipping sauce), raita (yogurt), and a little dessert. It’s pretty much a three course meal.
I also order the mago lassi which is pretty tasty.
This place is cheap! Which is fantastic. The only thing is that service is not the best, but it is not terrible. I have ordered dosas to go before, and I don’t recommend it. Dosas are best eaten immediately.
I also love the fact that they serve the water and food on metal trays. In case you were wondering why– this is the authentic way. I’ve been to southern India, and that’s how they serve it.
Also– some dosa eating etiquette: Using your right hand only, pinch off some of the dosa bread, dip it into the potato filling, and eat. This is a one-​hand job (that’s what she said).
Enjoy!

Don’t come here if you’re South Indian. You will be very very disappointed. The filter coffee was made with burnt milk and the set dosa and uttappam were abysmal. The only thing that held together was the butter dosa. They don’t put enough effort into pleasing customers.

For five years I was a dedicated vegetarian and for an additional two I was a pretty strict vegan. Chun P. and I were regulars at Madras, and San, the manager at the time, did a great job making sure none of the dishes I sampled featured ghee (clarified butter), dairy or eggs. I appreciate that he went out of the way for me like that.
Now I’m a recovering carnivore, but I still like to go to Madras from time to time. Giant dosa (all varieties, you can get them with potatoes and yummy curry vegetables), channa batura (curried chickpeas with a giant pouf of bread), vegetable bajji (deep fried curry vegetables — Chun P.‘s favorite), yummy okra, mango lassi, and on and on! All the food is very reasonable and served the South Indian way — on stainless steel plates/​trays. If you can’t decide what to try, drop by for the lunch buffet on a Saturday or Sunday. For $ 9 a person it’s a steal!

I read the previous reviews and guess they have good and bad days at this restaurant and today was a good day. This review is for the BUFFET only.
I liked the food here. I come from a city that is known for its Indian food (compared to SD), but Madras café was pretty decent. I liked the idli and dosa that was served along with the buffet. I thought they serve only 1 pc idli and dosa with the buffet, but I was wrong. They came back with more (though I couldn’t eat anymore at that point. I was stuffed). The food is south indian vegetarian and freshly prepared. I have a big problem with Indian restaurants passing off the food made the day before in the next day’s buffet. Thankfully, that was not the case here today.
(Note: hard core meat eater here liking the vegetarian stuff… so that says a lot)
We’ll go back for sure and hopefully the food is as good then.

I love Indian food and Madras Café was a nice change from my favorite spot Punjaab Tandoor just around the corner. They don’t have my favorite vindaloo but they have a nice diverse menu. We enjoyed the vegetable curry and the madras thali. The thalis are great because they give you a wide variety of the Indian dishes. I can’t tell you what all the dishes were but I recommend it and its a good amount of food for $ 9. Almost everyone at the table also got a dosas so I would also recommend trying one. I tried a bit of the carrot halwa which was very good and the rasmalai which was different with the cheese cubes but the sauce was good.

One of the few South Indian restaurants in San Diego, Madras Café is my go-​to place for most staple Southern dishes. Their curries tend to be sweet, but everything else on the menu is rather good — their lemon rice and tamarind rice are delicious, their poori is great, and their chhole batura is one of my all-​time faves. Their sambar and potato masala are both decent, and their idlis are always nice and fresh. I don’t recommend getting a thali, wait for the weekend brunches if you want to sample a variety of dishes.
They aren’t producing revolutionary new meals, but if you’re in the mood for some very traditional, South Indian vegetarian food, then this is the place to go.

The other day I was craving masala dosa, so I came here with high hopes of hot, fresh, crispy deliciousness with spicy potato filling. I was definitely very disappointed. My paper masala dosa came out cold, and was hard by the time I got halfway through it. The potato masala filling was really bland, as was the sambar (served on the side) I did enjoy the mint-​coconut chutney (it made my dosa somewhat enjoyable) but needless to say I was disappointed.
The lunch buffet cost the same amount as the entrée I ordered ($ 9) but I decided not to go for it because the food didn’t look fresh or appetizing.
I’ve been told by friends that good South Indian Food doesn’t exist in San Diego. I was hoping to prove them wrong, but this place is definitely not the place.

I have had horrible food and very good food here.
In 2010, 2011, the food was awful. When we had been to the same place in 2012, Thanks giving time, things were exceptionally tasty. For once they even had me trying Idli’s for the second time — the chutney was spicy and things were just amazing.

I placed an order to go and the waiter misheard my order. When I got home and realized what had happened, I called them on the phone. The person on the phone refused to accept his mistake, told me that I was the one who misspoke and hung up without apologizing. I hadn’t gotten angry until then, but I called back to speak to his manager and he told me that the manager wasn’t around, blatantly lying to me and wanting me to get off his back. there wasn’t even an offer to correct the order.
I cannot believe in this day and age that you get service like this. These guys have lost my patronage for good and I’d rather eat at Annapurna, which is only a few minutes away and has much better and faster service.

Best customer service and really good food. Can’t go wrong with them. Always consistent service and consistent food quality. Cannot ask for more!
We tried sada dosa and mango lassi and they were really good.
They are Jain Friendly restaurant as well.

Let me start with all the positive things I experienced here.
First, the chapati with korma. The chapati is not the greasy, thick chapati served at many restaurants. It is this light, fluffy, cloud like whole wheat roti with a super soft texture .the korma had potatoes, carrots and peas… I enjoyed every single bite of it.
The vegetable bondas were delicious with a tasty potatoes filly, fried to perfection yet not greasy.
My wife got the masala dosa. It was crispy delicious with a generous potato filling. Like everything else, not greasy, just right…
The ambiance is ok… very minimal decoration, steel plates, steel tumblers etc.
The only complaint I have is the service is very slow. The owner is running around seating people and cleaning tables while the waitresses just roamed around with not more than one plate or a jug of water in hand.
Try it for the food and I am sure, you will go back

Stick to the basic south indian food. Dont bother ordering thali (expecting rasam/​sambar/​poriyal and stuff), got Kurma/​Chole/​Bhindi masala :). Found it hilarious.
Otherwise nice food.

*** Note: I have not yet eaten at Madras, but I wanted to post this information for potential vegan diners***
I wish I could reply to a specific review but I don’t think Unilocal allows this. I read a comment from someone saying that this restaurant was not vegan because they used ghee (clarified butter) in everything. I emailed the restaurant to ask about this and this is the very prompt reply I received:
I’m glad you found the right place for vegan dishes. All our dosas are made with vegetable/​corn oil except the butter dosa. Please come check out other vegan choices as well.
I am looking forward to my first visit.

With western tastebuds and a tolerance for some heat, I really enjoy this place! I like the Madras thali — it’s like an a la carte menu of the daily offerings. It’s a ridiculous amount of food, but I am not against taking some leftovers! I even brought my North County coastal white parents here and they enjoyed it!
The Mysore dosa (crêpe with spicy potato filling) is also delicious. I still don’t understand what to do with the green minty sauce that comes with it, but the lentil (dahl) that comes with it is to die for!
I get a little freaked out by the big aluminum pitchers and cups they keep on the tables, for the water has then a metallic taste. so I only drink the water when my mouth is burning up.
One other gripe: please have a low fat yogurt option for the mango lasso. Us white girls don’t eat full-​fat EVER!

I don’t think this place is for everyone. I believe this is mainly (or entirely) south indian food and vegetarian. Aside from that, some of the dishes feel «too healthy» — like there aren’t any of those really creamy dishes with lots of ghee or oil like the other restaurants have. This could be a good thing or a bad thing, but I’m sure some people would not like this.
I tried the buffet here and there aren’t a whole lot of options. Some dishes are bland and some I just didn’t like — not because they were cooked badly, but because I didn’t like the dish. If there were more options I could at least hunt around for something I liked.
Best thing about this buffet is probably the price. I think it’s the cheapest of the restaurants in this shopping center at around 7 dollars, I believe. The pongal, pakoras, and tamarind rice were very tasty. They had some meat imitation dish that was also tasty despite the fact that I tend to stay away from these.
Service was good, parking plentiful.

We came here to meet our last-​minute Indian food cravings, and boy, were we glad we came! I’m now a huge Southern Indian Food fan!
Their dosas (indian «crêpe») are humongous and scrumptious! And we absolutely LOVED our vegetable samosas and mixed vegetable curry. SOOO GOOOD!!! I’m getting hungry just thinking about it!
Most of their menu items are vegan (except for yogurt that comes with the combo) and others can be made vegan as well, upon request. And their food prices are very reasonable, especially considering the quality of food. I love how everything is vegetarian! (We had trouble selecting items due to too many choices!)
The only disappointment was their bread selections. I was expecting naan-​like qualities and they were just plain breads. Nothing wrong with it, just different expectations! Next time, I’m getting a samosa, dosa, curry, and mango juice!!!

A solid dosa place, but ultimately falls short due to a lack of extras.
I remember ordering a cheese dosa, but it didn’t have a particularly large amount of cheese compared to other places I’ve been to in the SF Bay Area. They also only provided a small amount of coconut chutney and sambar here, whereas I can get 3 – 4 kinds of chutney plus a larger amount of sambar at most other dosa places. The amount of batter they use for the dosas seem to be standard at least.
This place is okay, but I wouldn’t go out of my way for it.