DTLA: Indian Buffet Lunch at Gill’s

 

On the perpetual lunch search, I had stumbled upon Gill’s Indian Restaurant when I first started working in Downtown. Then I promptly forgot about it until recently. Oh, I’ve always known it’s there but a discussion with the coworkers led to an impromptu research gathering trip. Who had the best Indian food in Downtown?

 

We arrived at the dimly lit, heavily decorated Indian restaurant inside the Stillwell Hotel. The back mirror makes the place seem larger than it seems. We decided to take a look at all the offerings before willy-nilly piling stuff on our plates. My first attempt was to get a little of everything.

 

Then I went back for my favorites. I normally don’t like tandori chicken because I think it tends to be too dry. I was surprised how moist the chicken was. My friend doesn’t care much for food on the bone so she was disappointed by the lack of other choices- namely where’s the saag? I like the spinach curry a lot as well so we did miss that. However, we were both surprised how tender the pork was and it was delicious. It was probably my favorite. I didn’t care for the chicken curry. The naan was fine.

For my last plate, I got some fruit and a little of the rice pudding. I felt a bit bad for how run-down Gill’s seems. The carpet has seen better days and it could do with less spooky lighting. But in general, the hotel seems to be improving with fresh signage so perhaps they’ll help the restaurant with better “outdoor” seating (the seating area just outside the restaurant’s doors).

For an inexpensive lunch, this place will do but for the best Indian food in Downtown? I think there may be better places. It’s time to do a little food crawl.

 

Gill’s Indian Restaurant

838 S Grand Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90017  —  (213) 623-1050

© The Minty  2013