Surya Indian Restaurant
1207 11 Ave. SW
Calgary, AB T3C 0M5
(403) 290-1777
East Indian lunch buffet. In a town like Calgary, it seems like most places of South Asian cuisine need a lunch buffet to compete. I’m not sure if it’s the vast quantity demanded by patrons, or if it’s the wide selection everyone likes, but all I know is most locations with a dining room, whether they start with one or not, end up with a lunch buffet.
Surya Indian Restaurant is located on the main floor of an office building in the Beltline. The first time i ate there, it was ala carte, and it was really quite good. That made the lunch buffet a must try.
The first thing you notice with Surya is that their selection is enormous. While many lunch buffets usually have 6-8 choices, Surya has 12 dishes, plus a variety of salads, rice, chutneys, desserts, and naan of course. They also have pappadums – which makes me really happy. The selection is fantastic – about the same as Glory of India. The quality is excellent – as good as Glory of India, if not better, and better yet, the price is much cheaper (13.99 last time i was there) than Glory of India. The keep refills low, and refill often.
Selection is varied – includes many meat dishes (usually 4), a load of vegetarian options, and a lot of starches.
One well known secret at most buffets is that they offer takeout buffet – all you can fit in a takeaway container. Surya offers this at the same price as dine in (many places offer a discount). While you may not get “all you can eat”, I find it’s much easier to manage portion size when you take it away. I typically get a couple meals out of what i can stuff into a container.
In discussions with friends, everyone has their favorites when it comes to Indian Buffet. While you can find cheaper in the NE of Calgary, Surya offers a unique value proposition. Good price, excellent quality food, and great selection in a very convenient central location.
f o o d o s o p h y 
The Surya buffet is known among my circles as the “afternoon coma”. All that rich food, coupled with multiple trips back and forth from the table to the serving trough, led to many an unproductive afternoon of work. Do you know if you can still smell that distinct curry scent in the back alley as it gets pumped out from the vents? I swear at times, I could smell it down at the Tim Ho’s a block away. 🙂
Sounds like I can write off my afternoon in the office. I wish we had a big East Indian buffet like that in YVR!
Danny,
We have a few….but the one I can recommend is the lunch buffet at Saravanaa Bhavan (part of a chain of South Indian restaurants). The buffet, however, is vegetarian (South Indian food) and you get all you can eat dosa and puri made fresh in their kitchen delivered right to your table at regular intervals. At $9.95, it is a phenomenal value.
I have not had a North Indian buffet here that I have enjoyed as much yet.
thanks for the review =)
Thanks for providing excellent food at a good price! 🙂
you know, I have yet to try Surya – for lunch or dinner. I do love a good lunch buffet though, and for me it is the variety that is the biggest draw – even though I know that often the quality of food is better a la carte.
I see this buffet in my future very soon… 🙂
Last night I finally ventured over to Surya… the verdict? Pass! Monday and Wednesday nights they only serve buffet at dinner, no ordering off the menu. While there was a decent selection, as you mentioned, none of it was very good! The pakora and naan were tough, the curries were all only so-so. The rice was cold… overall it was the most disappointing ‘Indian food’ experience I’ve had in years.
Maybe it was an off night?
Last week my girlfriend and I went down to Surya to what we thought would be a very enjoyable Indian lunch buffet feast based on the earlier reviews!!! But on the contrary we encountered something quite the opporsite. The selection was ok, but the quantity wasn’t much more than some of their rivals like The Taj Mahal and Iaracee said it before “none of it was very good!”. I agree fully.
Most of the food hada watered down taste. Especially the Beef curry and the Chili chicken. The chicken was especially disappointing as there it was not spicy but even worse the batter was overly soggy, it was like chicken wrapped in porridge. The Butter chicken was completely bland even though dark meat was used which normally would provide some flavor. But the worst of the worst was Muahrooms and peas dish. It was of course bland but it use FROZEN PEAS AND CANNED MUSHROOMS. I was shocked I have never seen canned mushrooms used a reputable restaurant.
The only saving grace was the Papadams which had decent flavor but although they were somehwat crunchy, as they should be, they were oily had a strange flexible/chewy texture and did not have the spice hot that I’ve come to love in good Papadams.
Needless to say I would say give this place a PASS and go to some of the restaurants in the NE or the highly recommended Taj buffet.
Laracee, Socrates
Sorry to hear of your less than stellar experiences. Combined with the report back from someone i trust who reported dinner was also mediocre, I’m at a loss regarding what to say. The last time i was there for dinner (4 months ago?), we ordered ala cart and it had slipped a bit, but not enough to complain about (though my significant other really disliked the dish they ordered). I’ve never had the dinner buffet – i’m curious if they just leave out the leftovers from lunch. I’ve noticed they are very very quiet in the evenings – low turnover could be starting to impact quality.
Needless to say, I guess I can no longer recommend Surya until they get their act together. I do know that a large corporation that occupied that building moved out in the spring, and they made up a large part of their clientele. Looks like tough times…
I ordered Pakora’s as have previously enjoyed them with my gf in various NE establishments…They were HARD, Burnt and looked like frozen and warmed up…. since i had done takeout it was not worth my time to drive back to reuturn…however i did throw them away they were hard to chew…..I also ordered a lentil dish which was very watery… perhaps its time to change the cook?
Customer service sucks. Food is okay, but tandoori chicken is not at all good, looks like it’s a left over from few days. This place is pricey with regards to the food quality and service that you get.
I know other Indian restaurants which are better in food with less / equal price. Won’t go back there again.
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