The Cholas

Jan 2015. The original Cholas has gone. It is now Northern Indian owned by someone else. So my review no longer relates to the new restaurant. If you want good Southern Indian, try going a bit further north across the road to Tanjore. — This is THE best Indian food I have had anywhere, and from any region of India, bar none. The food is fresh, delicious and full of great flavours and colours. Everything is prepared fresh to order. The menu selection is very varied with lots of great choices. The staff are wonderful; very friendly, courteous and eager to create a great dining experience for you. The restaurant itself is nicely designed and set, and is very clean. Have been there twice already in a month’s time. They have a great lunch and dinner menu, offer free delivery and catering, also. You will not be disappointed, and will visit often, I expect! Enjoy!

The dosa may be great, however the curries just lack due care and attention. A little cinnamon bark, cardamon pod or star anise might be ok, but not mounds of the stuff, while necessary for flavouring the food, for the most part this should be removed.
The curry also had an odd sweetness to it, despite being a supposedly hot dish, some of the heat was there but I was just to distracted removing the inedible… The chicken was only ok, certainly not the best meat I have had in a curry either…
All in all I can’t recommend Cholas, particularly when there are plenty of other better curry choices in the area.

Oh how the mighty can fall.
The Cholas was the newest opening in Edinburgh I was most excited about. It opened in March and I went about 6 times in 4 weeks, as my first review of it attests. I got chatting to the waiter, and learned that the chef was from South India and had been a South Indian chef for a number of years.
The food that was presented over the last 6 months at The Cholas was beautiful. Chana Masala chocked full of chickpeas. Chicken curries so delicately and intricately spiced. Paratha bread that was melt in the mouth delicious. Dosas that were crispy, and filled with flavouful potato or lamb.
But in the last 3 months, the food quality has reduced quite a lot, and in such ways that I can point out what has changed. The chana masala has about ½ has many chickpeas as it used to, and is far more a ‘sauce’ with some floating chickpeas in it. Before it used to be made up of almost purely stewed, soft chickpeas. The dosa once came (home delivery) with a lamb filling that had NO flavour or spice. They must have forgotten to add any spices, but it was tasteless. The chicken curries taste like standard «UK Indian» creamy, spicy curries but with no distinct flavour. The paratha is thicker, heavier, less buttery and fresh, and just not as great. The aubergine curry also has less aubergine in it.
This used to be a restaurant that offered what many Indian restaurants in Edinburgh couldn’t. Excellent Indian food, authentically cooked and spiced, with beautiful ingredients, good portion sizes with very unique dishes. The waiting time in the restaurant was lengthy, and the interior of the restaurant is also very ‘lacking’ and plain, but it was worth it for the delicious food.
Now, the restaurant is still lacking in décor, the waiting time is still very long, and the food quality has reduced so much that I don’t want to spend 30 minutes waiting for it and really don’t know if I’ll go back. I’ve ordered (both sit in and takeaway) 5 times from them since I noticed the change in quality, each time hoping the last was a fluke. But no, it seems to be permanent.
This is almost like a break up. I’m sorry Cholas. You still serve totally ‘a-​ok’ South Indian food. But it certainly isn’t any different or special to anything else served in Edinburgh, and you used to have something that no one could imitate. Such a shame.

I need to explain — I was invited to go here as a birthday present. The Duchess of The Cholas Tanja R was very convincing that I (as non enthousiast of Indian Food) would find this place as wonderful as she does. Especially the dosas.
Anita A. called ahead to advise we were bringing our own dessert — which was no problem (+1 Star)
So in a group of 6 we arrived at around 19:30 (you see where this is going — as I mention an arrival time) We were seated and I took a good look around the place.
An elongated place with dark wooden tables on either side and a dispensing bar/​order section in the back on the way to the kitchen.
I was hoping to elaborate on the atmosphere, but there was none. No decoration of note — OK I lied, they used those shiny metallic wrapping stars you use on presents. on the wall. about 8 of them evenly spaced over the place.
The table decoration was nicely done with the actual only bright colour in the place. Tanja R was warmly greeted by the owner /​manager and was assured tonight was going to be a blast!
That was a serious overstatement.
I will not go in to many details but I mentioned the time of arrival and after ordering (he made a really clear show of repeating every ordered dish back to us) and awaiting our starters, we eventually got our starters at 20:45 WTaF?! — We became a bit worried about what and why it took so long. As they kept forgetting water we asked for twice, and my beer had to be reordered too.
Evident ally they were busy. However a table of 3 that arrived about half hour after us got starters at the same time as us!
I was again assured by Menno V. Tanja R. and Anita A. that they had just recently opened and this is just unusual — however that statement was on shaky ground. When the main courses arrived (fairly swift after the starters) they managed to not serve mine. I got the rice, but no main. I shared the meal of others. We did ask where my meal was an he said he was going to check and reorder. However we were thus far that all of the other diners already finished and my rice was also about gone — we cancelled my main meal, my birthday meal! Not impressed. I had to eat from other plates to have a meal on my birthday. seriously.
Fair does to the taste though as all the food we did have was very flavourful. (+1 Star) But it would have been nice to actually have my own meal.
The Tiramisu that Anita made was very nice.
Little in apologies was supplied and they actually put the missing dish on the bill. at this point I started doubting the previous rating for Cholas of my fellow diners who even at this point still half heartily defended the place.
Another disappointment was the toilet. Beside not being very clean, I was just washing my hands and hand dryer didn’t work. (Yes Menno V. I did try to use the on switch) No paper towels, so I resorted to toilet paper, and the holder fell off the wall and onto the floor. I tried placing it back. Didn’t fit. Afterwards when going again it was back in place and at the first tuck it fell off again.
So they kept telling that this place just opened and they are usually not busy. Well when 5 star reviews are set you better get used to being busy. And now with the fringe in town — people will look for good places to eat and look at that all important star rating.
Even Tanja R & Anita A had to advise the owner/​manager that they will have to avoid going here during the Fringe as they are not looking to repeat this experience.
If they don’t get their act together, my review may not be the only one of its kind, but many more will follow!
I was so disappointed that due to all this waiting to get food — the whole evening was about over when we finished eating and we were too tired, too full (and miffed) to do anything else — well I did anyway. So home wards it was.
It should’ve been so nice — and I was pleased to have my good friends with me. But any other place would’ve likely been a better experience.

Cholas serves amazing South Indian food. I’m not usually into Indian food, but I was curious to try out this fairly new place after reading all the rave reviews. Well, I wasn’t disappointed at all.
For starters I shared a dosa which came with three different chutneys: coconut, mint and tomato. The dosa was light, crisp and airy — perfect.
For main dish I chose the lamb nilgiri with coconut rice. The flavours of this dish were just amazing. I cannot fault it it any way — the only minor issue is that the lamb could have perhaps been a bit softer, but nevertheless I enjoyed it very much.
I’ve got a mission now. I will have to come back and work my way through the menu — it’s just too delicious not to!

Recently I attended an Elite event at this place and I loved it. Seems I enjoyed the food and wine so much that the waiter still remembered me :-)
Ah, well, I thought to try out this place on it’s own and see how it stands out without the party buzz. It did not disappoint!
We ordered the traditional South Indian dish called «DOSA» as a starter. It was a plain Dosa, served with 3 different chutney’s: mint, coconut and some sort of spicy tomato sauce.
So engulfed in conversation I misunderstood the part of the refill and ordered another Dosa by accident — still, very nice, but filling :-)
The main was a Chicken Korma with a mild creamy sauce. The chicken was tender and the sauce delicious.
The staff was very attentive and patient, especially as I do not know much about Indian food, so he had to explain a few things to me.
There is not much space in there, such it can feel very crowded or loud on occasion, if there is a big party present. However, they offer take away service and you might try their delicious food ad hoc, at home, infront of the TV or serve a wonderful meal to your friends or partners.
Normally I would give 5*, but there is no other Indian restaurant I can compare this one to at current stage, but as soon as I have visited some, I might change…
I will certainly be back!

The Cholas, on South Clerk Street, is a place which has built up a devoted following in the few months since it opened and hosted the Unilocal team recently when I was away.
The Cholas’ menu of south Indian dishes is extraordinary in its diversity, encompassing a huge range of cooking styles, ingredients and flavours. We enlisted the help of our waiter, to ensure that across our party we got a good variety of dishes to try.
We decided to try the new Paneer dhosa that isn’t on the menu, it’s a thin rice and lentil flour pancake with Paneer cheese and fried onions that was very tasty, especially with the cocnut dip, chutneys and sauces. MH opted for the king prawns, then the lamb nilgiri, I ordered the chilli idli, then the fish curry. The service was really friendly and the waiter very patiently explained what dishes would compliment our choices.
M’s king prawns were good and the idli was a spicy but really tasty but the fish curry wasn’t as flavourful as I would have hoped. The lamb however was lovely.
So overall, The Cholas was a very interesting experience, as the range of dishes on offer was impressive though I think we need to go again to try more things, especially as the restaurant is such a new enterprise I think the food will only get better!

The Cholas really sums up why I love Unilocal.It’s the kind of place you spend years looking for, but probably wouldn’t give a second thought to if you just walked past it on the street. Step inside and it doesn’t look a whole lot more promising — a small, narrow restaurant, with beige walls and splashes of dark wood straight out of the ‘70s.
It’s really at this point, however, that the evidence of your eyes becomes much less important than that of your nose: aromatic south Indian spices, bubbling ghee, grilling meat and bread all jostle for your attention. If that’s not enough to convince you to grab a seat (and if it’s not, I really don’t think we’ll get on) the friendly, welcoming staff certainly will be.
So, to the food! It’s basically everything I’ve been looking for in an indian restaurant since I moved to Edinburgh — interesting, authentic dishes with varied, distinctive flavours and textures, properly seasoned and sensible portion sizes. It’s such a novelty to have dishes that aren’t drowning in fatty unctuous sauces, generic spice blends and two-​dimensional chilli heat.
The meat options are great, but it was really the vegetable dishes that stood out for me. Don’t think I’ve ever had such an exceptional brinjal curry anywhere — the aubergine actually tastes of aubergine, and is balanced perfectly by the delicate smokiness of the fresh curry leaves in the thick, sticky sauce. The dals are also brilliant, perfectly seasoned and spiced, with real texture and an earthy lentil flavour that really complements the other dishes.
This is definitely my new favourite Indian restaurant in Edinburgh. It more than stands up to Mother India Café — my current spicy hangout of choice — and even some of Glasgow’s best.
So, yeah, recommended.

I had been wanting to try The Cholas for a while based on several recommendations over Unilocal,and last Friday evening I managed to get there along with 2 other well tuned curry fans.
Entering the restaurant, we were faced with fairly standard décor. Woodchip walls, simple lighting and for some reason, adhesive gift bows stuck to the walls. We were sat at a table for four, which because it was an extendable table meant that I rather uncomfortably sat with my leg curled around the table leg for the duration.
The menu offers a nice variety of different dishes, and typical of Indian cuisine, veggies are very well catered for. Between the 3 of us, we ordered a veggie and a chicken chettinadu, a veggie biryani (all of which had the same sauce) and a dosa — though sadly just one of these dishes lived up to any sort of expectation.
The biggest problem with The Cholas is that they fail to remove any of the inedible pods and leaves before serving. This is either because they are rushing to get the food out to the punters, or this is a conscious decision to make the sauces differ from a jar Sharwoods sauce. This might be harsh, but the chettinadu sauce was identical to a pre-​made vindaloo sauce. In either case, the last thing you want when dining in a restaurant is to be gouging pieces of bark out of your mouth.
By the end of the meal we each had piles of bits and pieces sitting on our side plates. Perhaps a spittoon would have been a more appropriate piece of crockery to have on the table!
Negativity aside, the dosa was apparently «great» and the service was very friendly. The accompaniments to the poppadoms and the naan breads were above average and their lime pickle was darned tasty.
I’m glad I went to try The Cholas for myself, and I’m hoping they were just having an off-​night on Friday, but I don’t think I will be heading back there any time soon.

Popped in on the strength of the reviews here and had been trying to get here for some time, but due to one thing or another we never quite made it. By the time we all had a free evening to check it out we were really looking forward to the meal.
Positive side first I went mainly for the dosa as for whatever reason there doesnt seem to be many places to grab a dosa in Edinburgh and I wasnt disappointed. I opted for the masala dosa which was just as I remember. Standard set of condiments and nicely spiced. A nice touch was the waiter informed us that they would refill the dips free of change as much as we needed. Before the food we were given poppadoms and dips. The dips were great in particularly the mixed pickle.
Unfortunately the other side of the experience was that the 3 curries we ordered really werent good. They were a Veg Chettinadu, Chicken Chettinadu and a veg biryani. All of them were riddled full of the cooking spices that are normally removed before serving. Every mouth seemed to present some sort of raw spice from a full star anise to a the bark stuff I cannot remember the name of. This really wasnt pleasant. By the end of the meal we had excavated piles of inedible nonsense from our food. The curries them selves were okay I tried a bit of the Chettinadu and all I could taste was cinamon and star anise with a bit of heat on the back end… mmm.
I would go back for the dosa I guess, but that was it really. The service was good, the food as a whole wasnt and the 2 stars are for the service and the dosa alone eveything else was a thumbs down from me. :(

The food was really excellent. It’s nice to try some of the more unknown Indian options, but something for everyone if you prefer the more tried and tested tikka masala. The staff were very nice and explained everything we were eating and answered all our questions without being too in your face. Perhaps the list of starters was a bit too long as it was hard to choose from so many options. I’ll be back again as there’s loads I want to try

I had heard amazing things about The Cholas and when myself and a friend were looking for somewhere to go we passed this place and I thought why not! It was empty apart from one other table. The waiter was very friendly and polite but was hard to hear as he talked quite low. I went for the Chicken Masala Dosa as I wanted to try something different and had heard so much about dosas. Although the place was empty it seemed to take a long time for the food to come out which I didn’t necessarily mind but my friend had to catch the last bus home. I also found it a bit cold in the restaurant. While we were waiting we were given free poppadoms and then onion bhaji which was unexpected and very nice. The dosa was great and I’m glad I tried it out. I had a chai tea at the end which wasn’t very flavoursome. I like mine to have a bit more punch to it.
I was a little disappointed by the overall experience when I had heard so much good things about this place so I’ll definitely have to go back again to hopefully change my opinion.

We ate at this new South Indian place based on other reviews on Unilocal,and then ate there again because it was so delicious. We don’t get a lot of South Indian cooking in New England so we just asked our server to bring us a good meal, half vegetarian half not. Everything was fantastic, and he was great about encouraging us to eat things we’d never had before, giving us the choice of having it «British hot» or «Indian hot.» If you go, order a double order of the chili fried idli. You won’t be sorry. Limited beer and wine menu, but the Cholas special mint drink was a great alternative.

My friend and I keep walking past The Cholas everyday on our way to Uni, and today we finally decided to step in for a meal and what a meal it was! Being from South India ourselves we have been craving the flavour of genuine spices in our food; and today we were finally satisfied. The Veg Biriyani, Sambhar Idli and Channa Batura were all great and the Salt Lassi to go with the food was just the perfect drink to wash down our meal. We were also treated to complimentary ‘appalums’ (or papadums as they are referred to in the UK) and Gulab Jamuns which completed our meal. The service was wonderful and our waiter was the friendliest. I put forth the suggestion for including Student Discounts among a few other thoughts i had on the place, and the suggestion earned us a discount for ourselves!
Wonderful food, great service and affordable prices definitely make The Cholas the best South Indian restaurant in town! During the course of my next 3 years, my friends down at The Cholas are definitely going to be seeing me often!

Had an amazing masala dosa in this small restaurant. It is clean and elegant, the staff are generous and polite, they’ve got a good selection of food and puddings in their menu, and the manager is very keen on chatting and answering any question one might have regarding the food.
The prices are very reasonable and I couldn’t find any fault in this experience.

The Cholas has only been open for 20 days or so and last night was my second visit.
The food is is lovingly, beautifully prepared and served. It’s all authentically Southern Indian as my friend who has travelled there confirmed.
Without a doubt the best Indian food I have experienced. As a previous reviewer mentioned the portions are smaller than you may find elsewhere and also slightly cheaper so it does mean you can try different things. On both visits my fellow diners and I haven’t bothered with a starter course, instead we ordered lots of things to come at the same time so that we can share and try everything. There were so many interesting flavours to discover. They have some tasty teas and drinks too.
I can’t remember the Indian names of the foods that we had last night from the top of my head. However we did have a seafood curry, a vegetarian curry, a bread thing that was utterly delicious!!!, coconut rice (which I think I could just eat on its own), tamarind rice and a Dosa, which is a kind of Indian crêpe.
The décor is quite basic, it could put you off at first, but I can assure you without a doubt that it will no longer matter when when the food arrives to the table — the world is a brighter happier place! Perfect for these chilly times in the burgh.
I think the gracious and friendly waiter adds much to The Cholas. He was exceptionally welcoming, but not overly so at all. I could tell that if we had hadn’t been so interested to know about the food, South India and the new venture he would have been just as kind and efficient. He is clearly just as passionate about bringing this authentic cuisine to Edinburgh as the chef.
I hope they never compromise on the quality of their food. I hope it never streams out of the kitchen at warp speed in the form of lumps of meat floating in bland sauce!
I should also mention they don’t have an alcohol licence however you can bring your own alcohol.
I’ve been twice now, but would happily have anything I have tried so far again. Although there is still so much more on the menu I would like to try.
This is the longest review I have ever written. In case it’s not obvious — I really hope these guys do well. With so much passion for the food they make they absolutely deserve success. Plus my standards for good Indian cuisine has been raised to a level where if they leave I believe I would have to go to Southern India to experience it again.
… 20% off during March too.

After seeing Jenny L’s review, I knew I had to come along. I am a massive fan of South Indian cuisine, so Edinburgh’s dining scene is very exciting for me.
We came along, it was empty. This was probably because it’s new and hasn’t built up a reputation yet. The waiters were really friendly and the menu was very authentic.
On offer are thalis, uttapams, idlis, dosas, various curries, and various other dishes you would find in Kerala or Tamil Nadu. My boyfriend and I went for the classic masala dosa, whereas our friend who is visiting from Milan opted for the chicken masala dosa. Dosas are fantastic, as the batter is made of rice and lentil flour, meaning there is no gluten inside! Yay! Unless you choose the rava dosa which is made partly of cream of wheat.
While waiting for our food, the waiter brought a plate of poppadoms, mango chutney, lime pickle and a minty raita. These dips were slightly less authentic, but went down well. It was especially nice as it was an unexpected treat. We also got given a glass of a sweet sparkling mint drink, which was very refreshing.
The food arrived, and it was very nice. The dosa, whilst good, was not the best I have had in Edinburgh. That would be Tanjore or Kalpna, but it came close. Improvements? They could have supplied a little more sambar, made the dosas more crispy, and the masala filling could have been much spicier… Maybe aiming at British tastes? Despite these little observations, it was very nice, and for a new restaurant they did a great job. I think that a few simple adjustments could be made to make this on a par with the best dosas in town.
On the dessert menu: Gulab Jamun (deep fried sweet doughy things in a very sweet syrup), payasam (milky vermicelli pudding with Cardamom), Kulfi (the most delicious pudding ever: a condensed milk ice cream that comes in either pistachio, badam (almond) or mango flavour, flavoured with spices like cardamom, saffron), a few standard ice cream options, and a regional dessert which I don’t remember the name of which is made of rice and black lentils. I think it was a type of halwa.
I’d love to come back to try the thalis, some of the other typical dishes, and chat with the lovely staff. I love supporting new South Indian restaurants, as so few people know what an amazing cuisine it is. There’s more to Indian food than curry!