East End Eats: Indian at Last, and So Good!
Saaz
1746 County Road 39
Southampton
259-2225
Lunch and dinner daily
To say this end of Long Island lacks ethnic restaurants would be the understatement of the year. You can find seafood and burgers and pizza and “farm-to-table” restaurants galore, and pay mightily for any of them. But Indian or Thai? Okay, there’s Boa on Noyac Road, but it closes for the winter. Happily, this has changed with the recent arrival of Saaz, a lovely Indian restaurant on County Road 39 in Southampton. Previously home to Greek Bites and Spiro’s, which were quite good Greek restaurants but shortlived, Saaz is attractive and friendly and, best of all, serves good Indian food.
The exterior is fairly nondescript, but the inside has been spruced up with murals of Ganesh (the elephant-headed Hindu deity), peacocks, and some very bejeweled lovers. There is a small bar and seating area to the left of the entrance, a comfortable beige and white dining room with gold curtains to the right, and a tented patio dining area outside. Pretty lanterns hang inside the tent, and amber-colored votives are on each table. Although there are two flat screen TVs over the bar, the sound is off and soothing Indian music can be heard throughout the restaurant instead. Whew.
The staff are as friendly as can be, from the greeting at the door, through service, to your departure. Even the waiters who aren’t waiting on you are delighted you are there. So refreshing.
As soon as you sit down you get some crisp, salty poppadum with little dishes of cilantro chutney and a spicy cumin-laced sauce for dipping. We began our meal with lamb samosas, vegetable samosas, and stuffed ragda patties. The lamb and vegetable samosas were pretty good, the pastry thick but light and crisp without being greasy. They were filled with ground lamb, potatoes, and peas. We also ordered some mango chutney and onion chutney for slathering on our samosas and other dishes during the meal. The mango was pretty standard, sweet and slightly salty, the onion chutney was finely diced onions in a sweet bright red sauce.
The stuffed ragda patty, a mashed potato patty on a bed of tangy yogurt sprinkled with chick peas, chutney, spices, peas, and cheese, was also good. The combination of sweet, tangy, soft, crunchy, cool, and hot, which can often be found in Indian cooking, was well represented in this dish.
For entrees we ordered saag paneer, yellow daal, tandoori chicken, kadai lamb curry, chicken tikka masala, coconut rice, and garlic naan.
The saag paneer, a combination of spinach puree with cubed, mild Indian cheese, was okay. It was fresh tasting, but the spinach puree was more like baby food texture. The yellow daal, yellow lentils cooked with onions, garlic, and ginger, was an excellent version — just a bit soupy and nicely spiced.
The tandoori chicken arrived on a huge oval platter and was an entire chicken, cut into serving pieces, and was easily enough for two people for a mere $20. It was very tender, mildly seasoned, and I think my friends are lucky they got to take home the leftovers. The kadai lamb curry, a Pakistani style curry with green peppers, onions, tomatoes, and green chilies in a thick gravy, was excellent, full of rich flavor with tender chunks of lamb.
The chicken tikka masala was also delicious. Tender strips of white meat chicken were served in a thick red coconut milk sauce with fenugreek. We got a big bowl of plain basmati rice, which is the perfect accompaniment with these saucy dishes, but the coconut rice was even better. The same extra long-grain basmati rice was flecked with cilantro and had just a bit of coconut milk for richness.
The garlic naan was also great — nice and chewy with a bit of smokiness from the tandoor oven — brushed with some garlic oil and sprinkled with parsley. All of the naans, parathas, pooris, and rotis are made in house.
Part of the fun of Indian food is sharing and pairing, playing with your food, sampling a bit of bread with a chutney or spicing up your tandoori chicken with the onion relish. The variety of vibrant colors, different temperatures and textures, soft and soupy or crisp and crunchy, all make the experience interactive, or, more appropriately, entertaining. If you are a vegetarian, you have hit the jackpot. There is such a great selection of vegetable options in Indian restaurants, from okra to eggplant to chickpeas and lentils, peas and potatoes, tofu, cauliflower, the choices go on and on.
Our waiter, Rohit, was delightful. He pretty much asked us about 23 times if we were enjoying our meal. He offered suggestions from every category and made sure our water glasses were always full.
For dessert we tried the kheer and paan kulfi. The kheer, a kind of soupy cardamom-flavored rice pudding, was good, although looser than most. It was super sweet, as it always is, and was full of crunchy bits of toasted pistachio nuts.
We were intrigued by the paan kulfi offering, as it was described as betel leaf ice cream. Betel nut and betel leaves are considered to be either close to cocaine in their effect, or medicinal and good for you, depending on who or what you believe. I figured at the very least it would energize us for the long drive home, just like a shot of espresso or piece of dark chocolate might. It was a pale green molded ice cream, cut neatly into four portions topped with pistachio nuts. It had a slightly tart flavor, but beyond that, we couldn’t quite describe it. Kathleen suggested a cross between green tea and pistachio ice cream, which is close enough.
The prices at Saaz are very reasonable. Soups, salads, and appetizers are $6 to $15, entrees are $14 to $36, rotis, pooris, and naans are $3 to $6, desserts are $7. This was the first meal I have had on the East End recently where four people could dine heartily, with a few beers, for under $50 each.
I was very fortunate a few years back to spend some time in India. The food, the culture, the people, everything about the country was mesmerizing, gentle, beautiful. When I get a serious hankering for Indian food I explore new places in New York City. Frankly, I’ve never been blown away, even by the more high-end Indian establishments. Saaz is a quite good, exceptionally welcoming restaurant that I hope gets the business it deserves. If you live in Southampton, it offers free delivery!
In researching the meaning of the word “saaz” I found numerous translations, from “sea” to “melody” to “musical instrument.” The restaurant’s motto is “the symphony of spices,” so lets go with melody. From now on, when I venture west, I am going to Saaz.