Guests often ask for "medium", which is a number. What they usually want is flavor without pain — and those are two different dials in an Indian kitchen.
Masala is a blend, not a bottle
The spices that give a dish its character — coriander, cumin, cardamom, clove, cinnamon, fennel, black pepper — are aromatic rather than hot. We pound and blend them in-house, in small quantities, because ground spice starts losing its oils the moment it is milled. That is the flavor you notice in a Chettinad chicken or a rogan josh, and it has nothing to do with chilli.
Heat comes separately, from fresh and dried chillies. Which means a dish can be deeply spiced and barely hot, or blunt and searing. Ours are meant to be the former.
Ordering at your level
Mild, and still interesting: butter chicken, malai tikka, Dal Makhni, korma-style gravies, paneer dishes. Medium, where most of the menu sits: tikka masala, rogan josh, most tandoori items. Genuinely hot, if you want it: Chettinad chicken, vindaloo, Gobi 65, several Indo-Chinese plates.
Ask and we will cook to your line — for children, for a first-timer, or for the guest who insists on more chilli than the kitchen would volunteer. Raita, plain rice and a bread are the correct fire extinguishers; water is not.
Where to start
If it is your first Indian dinner, order one mild gravy, one tandoori item and one bread, and taste across them. If you have eaten this food your whole life, order the Chettinad and tell us honestly whether we hit it.
Browse the menu, then book a table — or take it home for 10% off with a pickup order placed here.
Tamarind & Co., 1275 South River Road, Cranbury, NJ 08512 · (609) 598-1397