Indian restaurant, Flavors, Cuisine of India, has quietly stepped onto the scene of Starkville, Mississippi. The restaurant is open to all customers with a dominant Punjabi menu.
Some of the dishes include “tandoori chicken,” “butter chicken,” “lamb curry,” “biryani,” “naan” and “lassi” among others.
Flavors is located on Martin Luther King Drive in Starkville.
Ankisetty Madhusudan, owner of the restaurant, said he has two other restaurants in Oxford, Mississippi and Memphis, Tennessee. He says he is aware of the necessities required to run a restaurant in a college town.
“We use high quality spices and only cook food when it is ordered. There is no pre-cooking at our restaurant. You can call it our specialty,” Madhusudan said.
Flavors Cuisine of India gives customers the options of gluten free, vegan, low calorie meals. The bread (naan) is handmade after an order is taken.
Madhusudan said spicy does not mean hot and we are very happy to alter spices according to the taste of they customers.
“Customers can order very mild, mild, medium, spicy and very spicy. There’s a misconception that Indian food means extremely hot.”
Teresa Gawrych, Department of Communication instructor, said she loves the new Indian restaurant.
“I’m excited that we have a new Indian restaurant in Starkville. Everything I ordered tasted delicious and I plan on going back this week,” Gawrych said. “Even if you aren’t adventurous with food, or haven’t tried Indian food, you should try a few dishes there because several of their dishes have food you’ve had before, but just cooked with flavorful Indian
Gourav Sharma, an international graduate student from
Punjab, India said the problem with Indian restaurants in the United States is that the taste is in no way similar to the authentic Punjabi food.
“I was actually surprised after having dinner at Flavors, it truly tastes like it is from my city back home. The best thing about the restaurant is that they vary their hotness levels according to your preference, you’ve got to have the sweet lassi,” Sharma said.
Madhusudan said the restaurant’s website gives information about the different kinds of spices used. “I think it is important to know the scientific value of every spice we use.
Some also help in curing health problems.”
Flavors also offers the option of a free home delivery if the order is over $20.
Bhupinder Singh, a Sikh who is originally from Punjab, said he is a vegetarian and wants an expanded menu at Flavors.
“I will be asking Madhusudan to expand the vegetarian menu, I really liked the Palak Paneer, Samosa and Malai Kofta, but I would like a few more vegetarian food items,” Singh said.In January 2014, another Indian restaurant called Bombay
Spice Kitchen opened in the same location where Flavors is now.
The restaurant economically nosedived within six months of opening.
Madhusudan said he is aware of the fact that an Indian restaurant had to close because of lack of customers, but doesn’t believe he will follow suit.
“They should have waited for some more time, you should build a customer base, in my opinion, a couple of years are required to build it and once your customers trust you they keep coming,” he said, “I have the resources and man power.”
“I want to cater to all kinds of people, take it off your mind that Indian food is spicy, we make mild, medium, spicy, very spicy,” Madhusudan said.
To order online, you can visit starkvilleindianflavors.com or call Flavors at 662-617-8226.
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Starkville gains new restaurant: Flavors, Cuisine of India
Pranaav Jadhav
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September 3, 2015
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