Anjapar Chettinad Elite

This restaurant is in Irving Texas, home to a large Indian community, accounting for nearly a fifth of the population of the city. Nearby Dallas itself has an Indian population of over a quarter of a million, so unsurprisingly there are plenty of Indian restaurants here. The head chef, from Tamil Nadu in southern India, was Bala Krishnan. The others chefs were from the same region of India. The restaurant opened in September 2025.

A mutton bone soup had reasonably good flavour, though for me it could have been a little more intense (12/20). Chicken tikka was the only disappointing dish, dried out from being cooked too long. To be fair, when this was pointed out the dish was removed and did not appear on the bill, so I won’t score it.

Mutton biryani lacked a pastry cap on the pan in which it was served (to seal in the aromas), but the biryani had reasonably aromatic rice. The mutton with it was quite tender. The rice used was short grained rather than the usual long grained basmati, but that in itself may have reflected the background of the chef. In some regions of India, short grained rice like seeraga samba is used instead of basmati, and this is the most commonly used rice for biryani in Tamil Nadu (12/20).

Crab Chettinad curry was good, with a sauce. Crab curries can easily be too buttery (I recall one at Trishna in Mumbai that was swimming in butter) but this version was fine, with a light kick of chilli to enliven things (13/20). Garlic naan was quite good, being soft and supple (13/20). A cauliflower chilli dish was pieces of fried cauliflower and was good. The cauliflower had nice texture and had a pleasant spicy flavour (13/20).

The bill came to just $33 (£24) per person, with just water to drink. Portions were very generous and we could easily have ordered fewer dishes and not left hungry. Service was friendly but disorganised, with my starter arriving after the main course. Still, this was a pleasant meal with some generally capable cooking, at a modest price.