Karen N.

I'd made a reservation at this restaurant for a family meet-up. You know how things have been from the past year; it had been quite some time since we'd all went out together. I live in NY but most of my family is at NJ so I drove up here for their convenience. I would like to thank Spice Rack for RUINING OUR DINNER. First of all, the place was overcrowded. Secondly, the place is horribly understaffed. Now that's a combination you never want to see in any restaurant. We had to remain standing for quite some time before a staff member led us to the reserved table.
For starters we ordered achari portobello and veg steamed momos for mom and dad while me and my brothers got chicken 65 and a squid preparation. It took ages for the order to arrive and when it did it was cold! The chicken did not even taste fresh. I wonder if all they wanted was to serve us stale food why did they take up so much of our time in the first place? Did they WAIT for the food to GET stale? Incredible! We complained to the staff about this, that man did not pay any heed. We were about to leave the place when dad insisted we stay, poor man cannot go restaurant-hopping at this age now can he? So we ordered the main course. Now the food was warm alright. It was Spice Rack chicken (we thought at least the dish named after the damn restaurant is bound to be edible), and lamb roganjosh for us and saag paneer for my vegetarian mom and dad. Well, warm was all the food was. The chicken yet again tasted weird and it did not have a hint of "spice". The lamb was OK but I have had much better roganjosh at other restaurants nearby. But that is not the issue here. If you are from an Indian household you shall understand the horror we experienced. The saag was saag alright but it was CHICKEN instead of PANEER! My parents got absolutely furious. When we complained to the staff he said we must've "accidentally" ordered chicken saag. Accidentaly?! Chicken instead of paneer?! The audacity! We wanted the order replaced but I had to argue my head off with the staff to get that done. It took another eternity for the panner saag to arrive by then our food had gone cold. Immensely immensely frustrating! And need I tell you how the panner dish turned out to be? At least this time it was veg. We did not even think about ordering dessert. Dad usually gets cognac after dinner and the cognac, at least, wasn't a disappointment. If Spice Rack had a brewery and distillery perhaps the cognac would have been disappointing too!

And no this wasn't the end of this perfect dinner! The bill came with an 18% fixed tip! I usually tip the staff generously even when the services are not at par. But here the staff was outright rude! Moreover the place is understaffed and the food takes ages to arrive. Well even after all this I would have given good tip considering the overall situation but the fact that they were forcing me to pay up! Unbelievable! Nobody had any patience left to argue about this. We had to shell it out. Thank you Spice Rack for turning a much anticipated get-together into an atrocious experience. Either close down the damn place or replace your staff, including the chefs. Those reading this, please visit any place other than Spice Rack NJ. There are many other restaurants fairly close to this place that serve genuinely good Indian food.