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DOSA – A review.

From Karthik On 23 January 2008 Comments

After having read multiple comments about ‘bastardized‘ cheese dosas, I walked in with with a lot of skepticism. I fully expected everything to suck and in a lot of ways, I wanted it to.

Dosa, located on 995 Valencia St., San Francisco was different in most ways. Just like my other favorite restaurant on the right coast, Dosa was trendy, pleasant and we were the only Desi’s in the restaurant, save the owner.

After a look at their menu, I settled for Bhel Puri and my friend for Pani Puri. Yes, my portion was bigger than his, but as far as the quality went, we were both surprised and amazed. Hoping that whatever we ordered next would be a disaster, I settled for a Rava Masala and he settled for a Masala Dosa.

The thing about Rava dosa is getting it right, yes it is as ‘easy’ as regular dosa, but a little extra oil can make the dosa damp and too little it could break into a million pieces. This would be the final test, or so I thought.

Again we were stumped. The dosa was amazing and the sambar would have made my mom storm into the kitchen and ask the cook for the recipe. Having been to a few South Indian restaurants, the things that everybody gets wrong are the Sambar and the chutneys. No problems here, the assortment of chutneys were fresh and exactly balanced. No too salty or ’stomach cramp inducing’ flavors. Plain well made chutneys.

After losing two rounds, I decided to give it one last shot and order their coffee. Although the friendly waitress said she could not make it ’stronger’, she assured me that it was good. After the coffee, I had to walk up to ask the owner the kind of milk they used in their coffee, it was just so… creamy.

More expensive than most South Indian restaurants, yes. Better quality and better service – definitely. I would not mind paying a few extra bucks to get consistently good South Indian food, that which every other South Indian restaurant seems to lack. As far as the cheese dosas go, I prefer to put that down under creative license.

Dosa is a hit in my books and I sincerely hope that this was not a one off day. I will update this post when I visit them again, after I get paid.

  • Runa
    L,
    Thanks much :-)
    I'm always on the lookout for good ,Southie saapaad
  • L
    Hello Runa,
    Madras Cafe and Komala Vilas are located in Sunnyvale, Madras Cafe
    Address: 1177, W.El camino Real,Sunnyvale. (In case, the link tag doesn't work again. )

    Komala Vilas

    address:
    1020 East El Camino Real, Sunnyvale, CA.
    Phone: 408-733-7400
  • Runa
    L,
    Where are Madras cafe and Komala Vilas located?
  • L
    I would also suggest Madras Cafe, , my favorite is their thayir sadam. Another favorite place is Komala Vilas
  • Quick gun murugan
    Well, don't expect any wine pairing with your dosas and idlis, mind it! Just real South Indian food with some sun tv in the background. Ignore all of that and just focus on the food and tell us all about it. I have tried only their lunch buffet, so no idea how the dinner is.

  • curious if you guys have tried Annapoorna in San Mateo.


    No fellows, just moved to the Bay Area. Annapoorna will be my next stop, hopefully this weekend.
  • One gun murugan
    I completely agree with RR. Annapoorna is one of the best places, if not the best, to have South Indian food in the bay area. I have also been meaning to try the place called Om in San Rafael, I never got a chance to do that yet.
  • RR
    curious if you guys have tried Annapoorna in San Mateo. I think it's the bestest and most authentic. what's more - completely homey and unpretentious. love the SunTV playing in the background, though I don't understand the language.
  • Karthik,
    Unfortunately next weekend is spectacularly bad for me - I have some previous commitments


    Fine choose other commitments over dosa ;). Let me know on when you are free, so we can coordinate this
  • Runa
    Karthik,
    Unfortunately next weekend is spectacularly bad for me - I have some previous commitments :-(
  • One gun murugan, sounds good. We should meetup. As soon as I finish unpacking my boxes, I will try to put up a post, see if there is someone else who wants to come by.

    Runa, OGM, how does next weekend sound? Feb 2nd weekend?
  • One gun murugan
    Alright! Let's all meet up to check out Dosa one more time.
  • Tell you what, it's on me. Let's to an Uber review. Maybe we can make this a meetup, but who am I kidding, I doubt there are too many SF readers.
  • Runa
    I am a little confused, what original review are we talking about?


    My bad - I meant I was waiting for the review- read it - almost decided on trying Dosa out - then read the comments - am confused - back to square one
  • The egg and the dosa came separate and my friend was super mad


    I would have been furious.


    Maybe they liked the blogger.

    Really?

    Just the ewview I was waiting for except that
    I am so confused after reading the original post and the comments


    I am a little confused, what original review are we talking about?


    There’s Saravana bhavan and udupi palace to compare to, and though their food is just as good, they’re not truly in the same league


    I have been to SB a few years ago, their food was ok, nothing to write home about, their serivce was terrible. Besides you should have seen them react to a girl in a dress. It was god awful. And after this, I stay away from anything named udupi.


    It was a weekday evening and the place was packed. We had to wait over half and hour to get a table. I thought the place was over-rated. The food was about average and so was the service. The customers were almost entirely non-desi.

    Weird, I was there on a weekday evening too, but we did not have to wait for a table. I have to go back and review this place again. So many people cannot be wrong.

    That or maybe they just like me :)
  • I went there about four months ago with my daughter who lives in SFO about. She had heard good things about the place and had read a couple of favorable reviews.

    It was a weekday evening and the place was packed. We had to wait over half and hour to get a table. I thought the place was over-rated. The food was about average and so was the service. The customers were almost entirely non-desi.
  • rax
    I've been to dosa several times (i live close by).

    when it first opened (i was there the first week), they had issues with missing orders and too little salt (or too much) etc etc.
    But all the times I've been there after that, I've loved the service, the food and the ambience.
    Thats the first southie place in the US where I actually found drumstick in my sambar and it was good.
    The coconut chutney was fresh with lots of coconut.

    There's Saravana bhavan and udupi palace to compare to, and though their food is just as good, they're not truly in the same league.
  • Runa
    Just the ewview I was waiting for except that
    I am so confused after reading the original post and the comments :-)
  • One gun Murugan, I have never heard a kind word about DOSA. This review surprised me, too. Maybe they liked the blogger. ;)
  • One gun murugan
    Hmm...interesting. I had gone there a couple of years ago and had such a bad experience that I never wanted to go back. A friend of mine ordered an egg dosa. The egg and the dosa came separate and my friend was super mad. From there on, everything was downhill. We were 5 adults and a few months old baby. They charged us extra service fee for 6 people. Bad,bad,bad.
  • Pondatti
    You should be ashamed of yourself for encouraging goat cheese. That's all I'm saying. Glad you had a nice dinner...SELL-OUT.
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