Malabar Feast - now disappointing :(

[Sue]

Just had a delivery from Malabar Feast  (in Maxted Road where the Ganapati takeaway used to be).

It was absolutely delicious, really well cooked,  very generous portions, reasonably priced and very speedy delivery (via Deliveroo but there are other options).

Very highly recommended and we shall certainly be ordering from there again!

ETA: Thread title edited on 10 April 2025 to reflect change of menu, change of management and disappointing meal.

Have retained the original post content, which reflected the situation at the time of posting.

Edited April 10 by Sue
Change of management and change of menu

[Froglander]

I have ordered from them and they do free delivery within a certain radius.  Have only had some of their vegetarian dishes which were all good including the onion bhajis that come with a very tasty spicy green sauce accompaniment.  Also, they start service from 1230 pm if you want lunch.

[Sue]

Just had another absolutely fantastic delivery  from here.

Not just head and shoulders above but a stratosphere (?) above any of the Lordship Lane offerings.

Really really delicious food and great value for money.  

Do try them, I can't recommend them highly enough!

[Froglander]

What did you order?

[malumbu]

Sue, not quite sure of your glowing reviews.  Next time I suggest that you order extra, PM me and I will cycle round for a tasting.  I'm a tough critic just to warn you.... 

[Sue]

9 hours ago, Froglander said:

What did you order?

Fish curry for me, Cochin prawn curry for Nyge, can't remember if it was plain basmati rice or coconut rice - we shared one portion- and a paratha, also shared.

We also got free pappadams with three different dips, all delicious.

There was so much of it we couldn't eat it all, I had the leftovers cold for lunch today!

That was the second time I had the fish (sea bass fillets) because it was so yummy,  last time Nyge had the Dal spinach curry.

They have lots of other things, including vegan, lamb and chicken, but neither of us usually eat meat.

It says on the back of the flyer that they can make adjustments according to your preferences.

And again, it was all delivered really quickly.

6 hours ago, malumbu said:

Sue, not quite sure of your glowing reviews.  Next time I suggest that you order extra, PM me and I will cycle round for a tasting.  I'm a tough critic just to warn you.... 

I'm usually highly critical, as you may have noticed! But this place deserves glowing reviews!

Just order something, I'd be very surprised if you were disappointed (assuming you like South Indian food, which this is, despite the lamb and chicken  options).

But by all means invite yourself round for a meal 😜

[zork]

I can’t say we felt the same sadly.. perhaps need to give it another chance 

[Sue]

5 minutes ago, zork said:

I can’t say we felt the same sadly.. perhaps need to give it another chance 

Really?  I'm sorry to hear that.

What did you order? 

Edited April 28, 2024 by Sue

[Froglander]

On 28/04/2024 at 22:14, zork said:

I can’t say we felt the same sadly.. perhaps need to give it another chance 

Yes, what did you order? I’ve ordered from there twice, once they messed up the order but delivered what they’d missed out.  Everything was vegetarian.

[malumbu]

Flavours are great, takeaway dosas really don't work as they are soggy not crisp.  I order dosas when eating at a small chain in Harrow, comparable flavours, crispy, and maybe 40 percent cheaper, reflecting Harrow not Peckham and that the chain has a good flow of eat in diners.  But Harrow a long way!

Certainly not a generic Indian takeaway which I find all the same.  

[Froglander]

Looked at their menu tonight and noticed it’s changed a lot.  They’ve dispensed with the onion bhajis.  They also don’t do their own deliveries anymore.  Has anyone tried recently?

[Lionfinger]

I've had takeaway a few times and they also catered for a party for me - it has all been totally delicious and the people there are really lovely and service completely reliable.  Very good value too.  Highly recommend!

Edited July 21, 2024 by Lionfinger

[Froglander]

Notice they offer a 15% discount for collection.

[Sue]

Oh dear.

Sadly I had a disappointing meal on Saturday night. I should have read Malumbu's review above before I ordered.

I thought I'd have a dosa for a change. Our meal arrived very quickly. However the dosa was more like a thick and very soggy pancake.

The filling was fine. The sambar (sp?) was fine. The chutneys were not what I was expecting, and had a consistency more like sauces.

 That might be my lack of knowledge of South Indian food, but I would have expected the coconut chutney to at least taste a bit like coconut.

I left most of the actual dosa. My OH said his aubergine curry was delicious.

I don't know whether the problem was that the dosa got soggy due to being wrapped in foil to be delivered, but tbh it didn't look like it had ever been a thin crispy dosa 😥 as I have always had in the past  at South Indian restaurants.

Edited January 20 by Sue

[Sue]

I passed Malabar Feast earlier today, and it said "Under New Management" .

Apart from the soggy dosas, which I don't think should be on the delivery menu, I really hope they don't change the rest of the menu, or the chef/s,  because it is our go to (bad choice of words) delivery place of choice, and absolutely everything else we have had there has been delicious.

[malumbu]

Recommend Dosa n Chutney in Tooting and Rikshaw in Gypsy Hill for dosas.  The latter a few mins away by train from East Dulwich station.  Karnataka has great food but rather a long way to go plus all those carbon air miles.  Reminds me of some American students in London who would take it in turn to fly back to Chicago or somewhere like that to bring pizzas back.  

https://dosanchutney.uk/

https://rikshawrestaurant.com/

My word, free reviews without having to sign up and pay for my food blog.  Crispy Dosa is the chain, not that local though.

Edited March 14 by malumbu

[Eats Dulwich]

1 hour ago, malumbu said:

My word, free reviews without having to sign up and pay for my food blog.  Crispy Dosa is the chain, not that local though.

If you are referring to me you don't have to pay to read my reviews and I'm not even sure if you have to sign up. If that feels too sinister you can just click on the links as far as I know, but the difference is if you sign up you receive the - free - reviews by email whenever they appear. Quite a useful - free - service I think.

I'm not going to spam the EDF every time I run a review, but here's a link to the site as I've run a few new reviews in the last few weeks. https://eatsdulwich.substack.com/

[Sue]

10 hours ago, malumbu said:

Recommend Dosa n Chutney in Tooting and Rikshaw in Gypsy Hill for dosas.  The latter a few mins away by train from East Dulwich station.  Karnataka has great food but rather a long way to go plus all those carbon air miles.  Reminds me of some American students in London who would take it in turn to fly back to Chicago or somewhere like that to bring pizzas back.  

https://dosanchutney.uk/

https://rikshawrestaurant.com/

 

We like Radha Krishna Bavan, a South Indian restaurant near Tooting Broadway station, but sadly they don't deliver to SE22.

They have really good lunch deals and the food has been excellent without fail so far, plus too much to eat (doggy bags willingly provided by the lovely staff!)

Probably wouldn't make a special journey to go there, but go there quite often for lunch when visiting my niece, who lives in Tooting.

Can't remember if they do dosas, though 

Edited March 14 by Sue

[malumbu]

I really need to do a tour of Tooting South Indian/Sri Lankan restaurants.  There used to be a SE22 curry club, think this folded before COVID.  Perhaps @Suewe can start a Tooting curry club.  And share our tadpoles stories at the same time.  Need to check that they survived the frost.

[Sue]

4 hours ago, malumbu said:

I really need to do a tour of Tooting South Indian/Sri Lankan restaurants.  There used to be a SE22 curry club, think this folded before COVID.  Perhaps @Suewe can start a Tooting curry club.  And share our tadpoles stories at the same time.  Need to check that they survived the frost.

Great idea! Yes, I think the SE22 curry club died a death. The restaurants were all much of a muchness at the time anyway, apart from Ganapati.

Nyge and I were also recently  discussing whether people would be interested if we restarted  the Forum Drinks.

They used to be fun, but I think the main organiser moved out of the area, as did some others,  and nobody else was very keen on taking it on.  Unless they are still happening covertly 🤣

If memory serves they were monthly, and in a different pub each time. It was good to be able to meet people in real life who post on the forum.

I might start a separate thread at some point to see if anyone would be interested.

[malumbu]

There was a brief discussion on the Lounge about the good old days of the Forum and the drinks where people with differing views seemed to get on fine with each other.  Can't find it or I would give you the link @Earl Aelfheah or @Sephiroth I think one of you had said something along these lines.  Yes go for it Sue!

[Sue]

32 minutes ago, malumbu said:

There was a brief discussion on the Lounge about the good old days of the Forum and the drinks where people with differing views seemed to get on fine with each other.  Can't find it or I would give you the link @Earl Aelfheah or @Sephiroth I think one of you had said something along these lines.  Yes go for it Sue!

I don't mind getting the ball rolling, but there would have to be more organisers than just me 🤣 I've got more than enough to do already.

Also as I often don't recognise faces or remember names, I wouldn't be an ideal person (though in the old days, we had labels with our forum names on, if memory serves) 

Sorry admin, I've gone well off topic.

Edited March 14 by Sue

[Sue]

On 13/03/2025 at 13:06, Sue said:

I passed Malabar Feast earlier today, and it said "Under New Management" .

Apart from the soggy dosas, which I don't think should be on the delivery menu, I really hope they don't change the rest of the menu, or the chef/s,  because it is our go to (bad choice of words) delivery place of choice, and absolutely everything else we have had there has been delicious.

We've  had another delivery since the change of management, and again it was delicious.

Hooray! 

The fish dish is really outstanding.

They do need to get their (new?) website sorted, as only one of the "menu" links seems to work (the mauve cloud one does bring up the menu - don't click on the one in the inserted pic though, as it's a screenshot!)

 

Edited March 19 by Administrator
Fixed formatting

[Sue]

Well, this is very disappointing.

Malabar Feast  has changed its menu again.

The delicious fish curry with sea bass no longer exists. There is now a fish dish with raw mango, which doesn't appeal.

I had dal and spinach instead, which was bland (which I suppose I could/should have predicted).

One of my visitors had a "vegetable Biriani" which contained hardly any vegetables. Along with it came two extremely tiny pieces of poppadom in a large paper bag.  

This was embarrassing, as I had been singing Malabar's praises and recommending we ordered from there.

The other mains and the parathas were OK, but I doubt we will be ordering from there again.

My granddaughters wisely opted for Yard Sale pizzas, which were fine.

Has anybody else had a similar recent poor (or indeed good!)  experience at Malabar Feast?

[Sue]

Their prices have shot up ..

What with that and the above, shan't be ordering from there again.

So sad 😭