Restaurant Review: Imli Indian Kitchen

Queen Village has a new Indian restaurant, Imli Indian Kitchen, at the old Ulivo spot at the intersection of Passyunk Avenue and Catharine Street. Living nearby, I was pretty stoked. Sometimes I just don’t feel like heading to West Philly for the New Dehli buffet or to Fishtown for an Ekta experience.

The decor of orange and brown tones with tasteful, clean tile work provides a calming atmosphere. The space is totally chill and makes for a nice spot for a relaxing dinner.

I visited on a recent Saturday at about 7 p.m. without a reservation. The place had a decent crowd, but we were still able to get immediate seating. The host and servers were all overly accomodating and pleasant.

Imli seems to be kid friendly with several high chairs and kids in the house and they handled a party of about 12 while we were there.

We grabbed the ragada appetizer which had just the right amount of crispness and nice textures throughout. I liked the combination of subtle sweetness with a mxture of spices. The ragada came topped with thin, crunch pieces of onion that were awesome! I devoured the ragada and forgot to grab a picture. D’oh!

We also ordered dal and malai kofta with garlic naan. I needed a second order of the naan to dip into the malai kofta sauce. That stuff is legit.

Overall, the food was tasty and solid without being real heavy. My guest and I actually loved the food we had. The prices were decent, too. Granted, I do vegetarian selections which tend to be on the cheaper side, but overall the menu seems reasonably priced.

If I had to complain about something, I’d wish each party got their own bowl of rice. We ran out of rice early on in the meal.

Imli sits nicely between the worlds of the buffets of Philadelphia and the higher end Tashan. If you’re looking for a relaxing Indian meal outside of the bustle of center city and not in West Philly, give Imli a shot. Hey…it’s BYOB! I’ll definitely be returning, maybe with a nice Czech Pilsener.