Aahar

I was worried about ordering Indian — as I haven’t had the best experiences in the past, but my sister and I were pleasantly surprised! Everything we ordered was delicious. I will definitely order again

I ordered delivery for a staff get-​together this past Friday in the party room of somebody else’s appartment. There were food allergies to consider too. For a $ 150 order, I found it very accommodating that this business would deliver to an address that wasn’t mine and make it a dairy and egg free order.
I ordered by phone using the menu on the website. The women taking the order knew her stuff and let me know delivery would take one hour.
I was delighted when the food was delivered earlier than predicted. It tasted straight-​up indian to my tastebuds. The dal dish was especially flavourful. The food was on the spicy side so it’s important to ask for mild when ordering for a group.

My boyfriend an I found this place thanks to the help of Unilocal.Located in a really random place in Ottawa, no matter where you are, the drive is worth it.
Probably the best Indian food I have ever tasted. A small, quaint restaurant they offer buffet, menu, brunch and pickup depending on the time and day.
I have tried their butter chicken as well as their garlic naan. The butter chicken is so creamy. The naan is good too but the garlic makes it even better. The lamb dishes are also very tender. Their curry chickpeas also make for a good vegetarian option. The spice level is decent. Not so spicy that you cannot eat it but good enough that it adds taste.
Overall absolutely great. My ultimate favorite Indian.

Wifey and I were in the mood for Indian food and came to Aahar based on the Unilocal reviews. Here’s the breakdown:
Food — Excellent: The butter chicken and shahi paneer were both rich, buttery, and served in very satisfying portions. We both had leftovers. The naan is fluffy and crisp in the right places, and the rice was basmati (you’d be surprised how often it isn’t) and cooked just right.
Drinks — Try the mango Cheetah beer. It sounds strange at first, but if you like the hard ciders or fruit beers, this will make perfect sense.
Parking — Not good. We got a spot in front, then watched as 3 other cars hopelessly tried to park in the back. You’ll have to try the street and pay attention to when you can and can’t park there.
Service — poor. Wifey is vegetarian. She specifically asked for different containers so our dishes wouldn’t mix. The girl who was our server frankly did not seem to understand what we were saying. She comes back with ONE container and now we have shahi paneer chicken. We tried to salvage what we could, but ultimately, I got a huge lunch for the next day. This is really disappointing as my wife really enjoyed her food. When we explained this to the girl, she said we should say it next time. HUH, but we already did?!
Price — for two people with drinks, 1 app, 2 entrees, rice, and 1 order of naan, it comes out the mid 50’s. Not bad, but not great. What I don’t like is rice being charged extra. I’ve been to other Indian restaurants in Ottawa, no one else does this. I’ve seen it in Italy, where they charged for everything. But hey, that’s Italy.
In general, we had positive experiences with the food. Service, on the other hand, is similar to what other Unilocalers have experienced, which needs work.

Aajao has a relatively small place, but a good ambience! Food was good too! Parking is an issue!

Yuck. I love Indian food and was looking for a new place in my neighbourhood. After the reviews I decided to order some delivery. I ordered butter chicken, lamb madras and naan. It was all terrible. The butter chicken was definitely rich and creamy but completely bland and tasteless. The chicken had zero taste or flavour. It was inedible. The lamb madras was somewhat better, but it also had little taste and very little spice although it was a madras curry. The lamb was also a little tough and the curry had large pieces of ginger, cassia bark and bay leaves. Just a mess. The naan was tough and rubbery not soft and nice. What a disaster. Never again. Maybe eat in is better, but I’ll never know because this place will never see another dime from me.

(EDIT: AUG/​2015)
TAKEOUT
For the first time, I tried takeout from Aahar last night and I have to say, I was a little disappointed. The main reason was the portion sizes which were pretty small, especially for the rice dishes which were in the same size containers as the mains.
Also, while it might be a one-​off, the beef in the beef curry was tough.
The Shahi Paneer which I loved so much the first time was still good as was the vegetable korma dish we ordered and the pakoras appetizers. I can’t say I was a big fan of the Butter Chicken though (not as good as I thought it would be).
So, I guess you can still have a good experience, but you really need to make sure you order enough food which may mean spending more money than you’d want. As such, I think I’d stick to eating in.
Rating dropped from 5 to 4 stars.
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Having just been to the theater to see ‘The Hundred-​Foot Journey’, the missus and I had a craving for some Indian food (if you haven’t seen the film, it’s very good and it will make you very hungry!). While there are two good Indian restaurants across the street (Taj and Little India Café), we wanted to try something different and I had been wanting to try Aahar for a while.
Well, I definitely have to say that it was the best Indian food I have had in Ottawa to date. This isn’t to necessarily knock the other places (as they are good too) but the dishes we had at Aahar that night were just… divine.
FOOD
While there are many things you can order at Aahar, I’ll run down what we had. All of which, I would order again in a minute.
Starter: Allo Tikki — I’ve never had this dish before and it was great).
Mains: Shahi Paneer — Butter chicken used to be my favourite Indian dish but this has replaced it. The flavour, the richness are just to die for… and you might if you were to eat it every day since it has cream and whipping cream in it! I don’t want to know what the calories were but I’d run every day for a week just to eat it again.
Palak Lamb and Chicken Tikka Masala — Both these dishes were great as well however my memory is still stuck on the Paneer dish.
Garlic Naan Bread — I have to say even the Naan tasted better than normal. It was fluffy yet crisp.
With regards to portions, after giving our order to the server he actually recommended that we had too much so we dropped another of the appetizers we were going to order. I thought because we didn’t order any rice that we would be able to finish what we had.
I was wrong.
For two hungry people, we still had leftovers (which were enough for my dinner the following day).
SERVICE
If there was one critique, I think the service was a little off. While the restaurant wasn’t busy at all, it was hard to get our servers attention for things like refilling our water. But I wouldn’t say the service was slow (with regards to having to wait for our food).
PRICE
I think with regards to the quantity and quality of the food you are getting, it is a good deal. Dinner for two (with leftovers for one) plus a drink was $ 60 (tip not included).
OTHER — PARKING
Parking here is questionable. I think they have space for maybe 3 – 5 cars in total that can park around the building. Parking on Churchill is questionable (I don’t think you can but maybe I’m wrong). That leaves the two side streets just north of the restaurant, or maybe the parking lot adjacent to the restaurant which is for another office building.
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So, would I go back? Most definitely! While I haven’t been to all the Indian restaurants in Ottawa yet, this is definitely at the top of my list at the moment. They have a lunch buffet as well and I asked if they include the Shahi Paneer dish I had and the server stated it was included depending on the day (as they change their lunch buffet). So, I guess I need to check it out for lunch!

It doesn’t look like much from outside but inside the place is beautifully decorated. Special attention was paid to the details which gives the whole place a warm and welcoming feeling. Traditional Indian music plays softly in the background. The ambiance in the restaurant adds to the whole experience. We were seated immediately upon arrival and our orders were taken promptly. The food was made fresh to order. Each dish was unique and delicious and served in simple but neat silver bowls. The garlic naan was hot and a must have for any meal. Between two people we ordered three dishes and one order of basmati rice. It was more than enough food and we had plenty of leftovers. I especially enjoyed the Butter Chicken and the Lamb Korma. The Mango Lassi was very yummy. I left the restaurant feeling quite satisfied.

Impressive décor. I came here while on my trip last month to Ottawa. We were looking for a nice place and since I was craving desi I checked this place out. It was really nice, the food itself was great, the presentation remarkable. I loved the service and how they had a nice full bar. I will come back and highly reccomend this place!

I had the «meal for one» with lamb. Great food. I especially liked the yellow curry.

In Ottawa for business 8 days, and 3 days in there’s over a foot of snow on the ground. After a Sunday spent working then wandering through downtown Ottawa, I was looking for a cozy indian place to snuggle up to a bowl of curry.
Asked the hotel staff, and they recommended Aahar. Checked Unilocal and teh interweb, and both looked promising. I pulled up to a tiny place with very little parking, right off the main drag. It had an outdoor patio that was out of commission, but would be nice if the snow ever stops falling in Ottawa.
It was less than an hour until closing, but they still had the buffet rolling. There were only 2 other groups when i arrived, but they refreshed the entire buffet right after I was seated, which I thought was very kind.
Had the Yellow Veggie Curry (delicious) the chicken tandori (lovely), the mixed vegetables (great), and then they brought out a fresh tray of butter chicken to the buffet, and a basket of still steaming naan to the table. Folks, I was in heaven. The naan and the butter chicken were some of the best I’ve ever had. I had it with a dark cheetah beer, and if they rented rooms I’d still be there.
Highly recommended if you’re on the west side of Ottawa for work or pleasure. Also, did I mention they do a brisk delivery biz to local businesses and hotels? Winner Winner, Butter Chicken Dinner.

Found it on Unilocal,best Indian food I’ve bet had in my life! Good value for the price, don’t be In a hurry when you go. Quality food takes time!

Still pretty good per my previous review. I don’t recommend the «mango beer» though.
Will try the a la carte next time rather than the buffet for something different.

My spouse and I went for the lunch buffet. Unfortunately they did not have the butter chicken on that day, but had other items and the paneer which was delicious.
We often order out the butter chicken with Naan bread. The butter chicken is especially buttery!

Amazing, kind service staff and phenomenal food!
Don’t let the exterior fool you, this is by far the best Indian food I’ve ever had. Don’t let yourself get roped into ordering generic indian food like buttered chicken, the entire menu is absolutely amazing.
It really is unfortunate that I don’t come to Ottawa very often because I would eat here every other day, if you are looking to expand your culinary horizons give this place a try, you won’t be disappointed.

I have passed by this place many times. Finally we decided to drop in. The layout of the pace is square and a little tight. We were seated along the wall as was everybody that was there at the time, not sure why. As the place started to fill, clients were seated around the perimeter with no one being seated sitting in the middle weird (or is it me?). Anyway, the service was laid back almost too much for me (it took 10 minutes to get a beer) but it was consistent. We ordered the baingan bharta, lamb patak, shrimp pakora, and veggie samosa… oh and an order of naan bread.
I have never been a fan of eggplant but the baingan bharta was amazing as well as the lamb patak… in fact all the food was excellent. There was lots of food. For just over 50.00 we fed two people (includes 2 beers) and we were stuffed… A container was provided to bring the delicious leftovers home which I hid from my son and consumed for breakfast the next day… MMMmmmmmm
Needless to say I will be going back and I will not be in a hurry. I will bring more people so as to try different dishes.
There is a lunch buffet that I must check out!

Aahar is a very reliable Indian restaurant, ranked even higher because it is in an office and strip mall area that has few culinary gems to offer. (Am I missing something Ottawa Unilocalers?)
I understand that the restaurant was originally a convenience store that used to sell homemade snacks. The snacks became so popular, they gave it over entirely as a restaurant.
I visited a couple years ago after it first opened. Great quality food, and all-​in-​the family service. (I recall one elderly guy whose only job seemed to be to put new napkins on the tables.) Off-​the-​menu dinner service was terrific.
Went today for the lunch buffet and was very impressed. Not as many items as Host — my new favourite — but what they had was very nice. Could use a few more condiments, including a spicy chutney or chile sauce.
Standouts were the chile chicken and lamb mint stew. Paneer (cheese cubes) in butter chicken sauce was kinda weird, very rich but really tasty. But cream of cheese is not for the lactose intolerant. Also noteworthy was the big tray of watermelon cubes. All Indian food should be served with watermelon cubes. Heck, watermelon should just be served at every meal period.
Chuck is right. Parking is rough. Consider parking on the side streets north of Carling instead.

We used Unilocal to discover this 5 star gem and were not disappointed. In fact, it may have been the tastiest Indian food we’ve enjoyed to date.
The small house that it is situated in is unassuming. The interior décor features authentically Indian furniture set in rows with bright lighting. Our server smiled warmly but seemed a little shy as we sought her advice on a possible combination meal. There is one on the menu so we ordered it so we could maximize the number of dishes to sample. The result was food nirvana. It included a large serving of naan as well as dessert. Each dish was served in a separate stainless steel small bowl. I choose a combination featuring lamb and my wife opted for the chicken however only one of the six dishes included our specialty.
We highly recommend this restaurant for it’s wonderfully cooked food.

Some of the best Indian food to be found. The service is amazing, and the furniture is truly ornate. Parking can be sketch though.

Great food — the best Indian food we’ve had in a restaurant in a long time. Unassuming from the outside, but full of good service and tasty food on the inside at a great price.