If there’s one thing that vexes me more than anything, it’s the Indian buffet. The only thing I despise more is when somebody on Yelp says “Their buffet is not very good…” as a critique for an Indian restaurant!  If someone told me a place has a good buffet, I would tell them that they lack a sense of taste.  Nevertheless, there are not many Indian restaurants near where I work, and I would walk past Tantric on almost a daily basis to get food from another place that doesn’t serve as an abomination to my people’s culture.  But at one point, I finally decided that I must go to Tantric if I can properly dismiss it like I dismiss every other Indian restaurant in Boston.

Tantric makes the mistake of every other Indian restaurant buffets by trying to combine North and South Indian cuisines into one.  I have never, ever, ever eaten at a place that serves both good North Indian and South Indian food.  Either they make the South Indian food too bland, or the North Indian food too indigestible.  Each cuisine deserves a certain amount of respect, and as such, should not be mixed.  On this plate (clockwise) is navratri korma (mixed vegetables in a creamy gravy), spinach pakora, lemon rice w/daal, and muttar paneer.  The North Indian dishes are definitely the specialty at Tantric, as the lemon rice was bland and too lemony.

I was surprised to discover that the meal came with a complimentary masala dosa.  Normally getting free things with a meal is nice, though on this instance it was almost a chore as I had to stomach the bland starch-wrap that pretended to be a dosa.  The coconut chutney and “sambar” were also boring and flavorless.

I came back for some more of the muttar paneer (which was actually not bad), naan, tamarind sauce and mint chutney and more vegetable pakoras.  While I’m not a fan of most Indian restaurants in Boston, I do find that the trend is making really good chaat.  The mint chutney and tamarind were not bad, though the pakoras were a little too greasy for my liking.  The naan had the look of a barren desert, and the taste of a rubber tire.

Finally, I decided to go with the rasagula, a milk sweet that is vastly inferior to gulab jamun, but I’ll eat it anyway.  It was obviously from a can, and didn’t taste very good cold.

Overall, as Dennis Green once said: “Tantric was what I thought it was.” A mediocre Indian restaurant with a buffet.  Perhaps their a la carte menu is better?  Unlikely.  From my experience, any Indian restaurant that willingly puts out crappy food in the form of a buffet does not care about what people eat.  So, I’ll give Tantric one and a half cheese sandwiches, primarily because they have a decent vegetarian selection.

Tantric India Bistro
123 Stuart Street
Boston, MA 02116
(617) 367-8742