Vaanga Boston

I visited Vaanga near the State MBTA Station, and I’m so glad I finally decided to try this place. I kept debating whether to go or not, but honestly — the food here is so, so, so, SO good. Truly worth it. I ordered the Chicken Tikka Masala, and it was fantastic. The flavors were rich, the portions were generous, and I even spoke to the staff about how they prepare it. One of the women working there was extremely kind and walked me through why they add bell peppers and onions to their tikka masala — something I’ve never had before. It actually made the dish taste fresh and flavorful in a unique way. I loved it. The place was pretty crowded, which speaks for the quality. The prices are also very budget-friendly compared to many other spots in Boston serving similar food. I’m already planning to come back for the Butter Chicken and try a few more dishes — just didn’t get the chance this time. The only downside: if you pay by card, there’s a 4% extra charge, and the cashier didn’t mention it beforehand. I only noticed it after checking the bill, so that was a little disappointing. But overall, this is a great spot with delicious food and warm staff — highly recommended!

We had pav bhaji, superstar dosa and chicken kathi roll. Pav bhaji and dosa were amazing! Did not like the kathi roll that much. It had a lot of cucumber. Also, sweet lime soda was great!

I ordered poori, parata, and fried rice, and everything came out fresh and tasty. The poori was perfectly cooked, the parata was soft and flavorful, and the fried rice was really satisfying. I also tried the cakes for dessert and they were really good, a sweet finish that felt worth it. Special mention to the front desk team, they were welcoming, polite, and very helpful, which made the whole visit feel smooth and pleasant. I will definitely be coming back.

Vaanga, located in Downtown Boston, offers a lively twist on traditional Indian cuisine, with a menu featuring South Indian street food, dosas, biryanis and Indo-Chinese dishes. We ordered Superstar Dosai and Idli. The sambhar is quite spicy, so be prepared if you prefer milder flavors. I was also surprised to see that there is no drinking water available. Pls bring your own or order a drink. Service is generally quick and staff are friendly. Overall, Vaanga is a good spot for a quick, casual lunch or takeout option in downtown Boston.

Not much to the back area and it’s hard to tell that they are open but the food is SO GOOD. insanely huge dosa very crispy. Ask for mild unless you are genuinely brave, even my Indian friends go mild here. Truly bomb.

The food was good, but the lady at the counter was quite rude and seemed uninterested in working there. She didn’t have change for a $20 bill and asked us to pay online in an impolite manner. Additionally, the to-go order was thrown instead of being handed properly. Overall, the food was good, but the front desk staff needs improvement.

We were in the area on Thanksgiving Day and this hidden gem happened to be one of the few places that was open. The food was amazing and the decor was fun! Highly recommend ❤️

Vaanga Boston has surely become my go-to place for having a nearly authentic Indian cuisine in Boston. I'm overjoyed with the taste they serve, it was finger licking and surprisingly the portion size is bigger than usual. I would highly recommend this place for everyone who craves Indian food especially at an affordable price*. The receptionists are kind and helpful. Kudos to everyone for making my weekend a memorable one.

The curries and naan are great, tasty with decent portions. Our paneer kati roll was gross. I'm not sure if ranch dressing is a common topping but it totally ruined it. Otherwise a perfectly good spot.

Food (1.5/2): Great food option for what I think is an authentic Indian cuisine, though I'm not sure which particular region this is coming from. All I can say is their rice dish is full of spice (and actually spicy, in a very good way), which makes you want to just cram more food as you eat. You can taste their chicken and rice are very well-seasoned with a great balance between the spices (maybe the spicy part is a bit too strong). A minor negative for me is just the amount of "protein" that comes along with the dish--I wished they'd give a bit more. Service/wait-time/cleanliness (1.5/2): Difficult seating arrangement but service was otherwise very friendly, though not particularly fast. The wait-time was decent, the longest being trying to get a seat rather than the food itself. Cleanliness is so-so. Price (0.5/1): Their pricing I think is fair, for the quality and portion of food that they provide.

One of the worst indian restuarants I've had the misfortune of going to. Over the past four years, I've seen this crappy owner pay people to post positive reviews on Google Maps - Yelp seems a little less bought off, but I haven't looked closely. This guy will hire ten people to post five star reviews with food that obviously isn't from them/isn't representative of the slop they serve to customers every time they dip under 3.5 stars. The service was ass when I went, practically nothing on the menu was available (based off of asking for four different items before having to ask what exactly they even had), it was a long wait for very little food, and ****it was so freaking bad that I can't forget about it or let it go!!!**** Back when I went, it was like the only indian restaurant in the area, which makes how bad it was even worse. Is this what we are representing as an Indian community in a densely populated city? Actively shocked these guys aren't out of business, because I had a friend come here recently and tell me it was still awful!!! I will continue watching this crappy conspiracy mess of a restaurant until it shuts down.

Chicken tikka masala was a lot sweeter than I am used to. Naan was good. Service was quick and friendly. Looking forward to trying other options.

Casual place for Indian food. Order at the counter off the extensive menu. We had the tikka chicken, butter chicken, and order of naan. Each entry comes with rice which is a nice bonus. Food was tasty, service was efficient, and the place is very simple.

Took a to go order from Vaanga. The Madurai chicken burger and mutton kati roll were both flavorful. The only suggestion I have is to increase the filling in the burger. There was hardly any chicken, though what I had was flavorful.

Very flavorful daal curry . Many options to choose from, all affordable. It's a Fast casual place as expected for these prices.

Great quick service and amazing Indian street food. Ended up trying dahi puri, chicken curry, chicken noodles ... Loved the food The service was quick

Absolutely nasty food. Ordered the angry chicken and kawhala fried chicken and the angry chicken was just awful, dry and funky tasting. Restaurant was dirty as the trash bins were overflowing and flies were buzzing around me as I tried to eat.

Decent food with north Indian touch.. Doesn't have great seating area.. Tables were dirty, but the food made up for it.

So I tried this place twice. It's very near to where we stay, right at heart of downtown which is a plus. First day we picked up. We had mastan bhai biryani, angry chicken noodles. The noodles was bad. Not at all what we find in India specifically Kolkata or Chennai. I don't know where this is from. But not great in taste. The biryani tasted good but there was so little mutton. So we thought of giving another shot. This time I got it delivered through Uber eats. Omg.. waste of money. First of all Uber eats costed more than Grubhub but Grubhub had no way to write any thing. So I paid extra to write on Uber eats that mutton pieces was really less last time. Well they failed big time. The biryani was so bad, felt very old. Mutton pieces were there but so old and chewy. That's it. Thank you. One more Indian restaurant which failed to keep the taste and quality consistency

I've had better food at the most shadiest bodega. The food at this place is not worth the price. I'm not against good Indian food being expensive but this place was a HUGE disappointment. Took me 30 mins to find a parking space. It took them 25 mins to give us 4 items. Tried almost 6 items with my friends, nobody liked a single thing. I just wasted my $117. The only good thing I found here was a bottled water.

I tried this place recently to explore more Indian food options in Boston. There was hair in the rice... I can't really speak to flavor as I didn't want to eat it after seeing that. Hygiene standards need to improve

Visiting Boston and craving Indian food. On a Sunday this place is packed. Service was great / although I come from a north Indian background I asked what would be the spiciest chicken curry options - I went with the chettinad chicken (South Indian dish so something new for me) and got a side of rumali roti because I am obsessed with these. Slight wait which I don't mind because I know it's all fresh then. Got back to my hotel and dug in - spicy and flavorful chicken. Cooked well. Rumali roti had a slight transparency to it which is exactly what you're looking for. While waiting I noticed the freezer had tons of Indian ice cream bars and reminded me of when I've visited india and would grab ice cream from the carts! I wasn't feeling sweets that day but I would recommend to try one. Can't end the review with saying how amazing the decoration was - very lively and would be fun to eat here.

Be prepared to get food poisoning. Service is as unprofessional as it can get. Sitting layout is also weird.

This place was awful, I really had high hopes for it--but was severely disappointed. The food was greasy and poor. There was no bathroom. And service was self, no customer service whatsoever. Considering pricing is akin to a restaurant, I would expect restaurant quality service. But alas, that's not the case. Would not recommended.

I have only ordered delivery via Uber eats for this restaurant. Food is generally ok, but what I like the most is that they serve rumali roti, which is hard to find at most Indian restaurants. However last order I got small parathas instead of rumali rotis (see picture) and was SO disappointed. Everything is over priced!

Don't know why the rating is so low for this place. I got the "Sunny Leone" Combo with lamb curry. I like the naan. It has the right texture. The lamb curry is very good too. I eat more rice than normal as I want to finish the sauce. The chickpea is ok though. It's a bit bland. The combo is good to have a bit of everything. I just wish they have more portion for the lamb/ chickpea and less rice for better value.

I love chicken tikka, not to be confused with chicken tikka masala. It's normally one of my fave dishes - a spicy grilled chicken. The chicken was over cooked and dry. The spice blend was very different from almost every version I've ever eaten. Not different in a good way. Not a fan.

The food is absolutely divine. Full of flavor. I always order through DoorDash and it's always very quick delivery. The butter chicken has so much flavor and I would eat it every day if I could. The binyani dish is also extremely satisfying. Thank you for this hidden gem.

We tried masala dosa, pav bhaji and samosa burger. Masala Dosa and Samosa Burger was amazing! I was not happy with Pav Bhaji. I recommend trying this place!

The Andhra style chicken curry (I got with gongura) was insanely flavorful. Tangy, savory, and super spicy! It was delicious and came with rice. Super oily, but worth a taste. I also got a filter coffee, which tasted sweet. It's fast casual and the place has relatively vibrant decor.

Our go to indian spot in downtown Boston. Spicy is certainly spicy. Customer service can be a bit of a drain. Dine in experience is lackluster so we just get it to go. Unfortunately tonight they put our veg madrasi in a container that was cracked so it leaked through the bag and got all over my car :(

Steer clear of this place if you care about cleanliness at all. The food is incredibly disappointing

I have to make this review because I'm just so shocked and disgusted. Besides the fact that they gave me roti instead of naan, the food itself is not bad, not great. Everything else is review worthy and not in a good way. Issue #1: I went in to order and waited 45 minutes for my food. It took them 15 minutes to even acknowledge me and take the order. That's on me for not leaving after 10, to be honest. But by then I was like you know what, I already came here and waited this long I might as well wait a bit longer. Had no idea how long it would actually be!! The poor old man in front of me was waiting for longer than that! An hour?! Unacceptable - especially watching how disorganized they are which definitely explains the long wait. I don't remember a time when I waited this long for food in person anywhere. This unexpected delay threw off my schedule and created a domino effect that had me running behind the entire rest of the day which I really don't appreciate. Issue #2: UNSANITARY! I watched an employee manage an uber eats order. She had gloves on. She opened the order and dug through it with her hands (assuming to make sure it was correct?). Then she just put it back how it was and patted it on top. When rice fell on to the counter, I watched her pick it up and put it back in the bowl. What?! I told her that I saw that and that's not right. Then this same employee wipes her nose with her hand with the gloves still on and continued making someone else's order. What?! Disgusting. I spoke to another employee and told her I didn't want that person touching my food, and why. Issue#3. Their sign at the front says cash tips are EXPECTED AND ACCEPTED. It was amusing at first because of how tacky it is to demand tips. But after the poor service, it actually offended me. How are you going to provide an unsanitary and subpar experience and then have the nerve to say you expect a cash tip? Yeah, you should EXPECT exact change *insert side eye*.. Never going back, and if you want a pleasant and timely experience, I'd caution others to do the same Oh! and to top it off, the hot food is not fresh. I watched them microwave orders back to back to back and send them off. Goodness gracious.

Excellent food - absolutely amazed by quality of dosas (thin, crisp) as well as lassi. Great place! Wish they were open on weekends late too!

Not sure why this place has only 3 stars. Got the paneer butter masala and it was amazingly sweet and creamy!

I ordered food using DoorDash. I ordered.Chana bhatura. The gravy was all there was with you few floating chickpeas in the smallest container I've ever seen with two rolls of think chewy terrible bhatura. No pickles.

We decided to go to this place based on Google reviews and this turned out to be a bad idea. The place is small and filthy. The chairs and tables have worn out colors and there was food on the floor. This was when there were only 5 people in the restaurant. This is certainly not a surrounding to have while you eat. I am not sure how bad the kitchen is if the seating are is dirty. Since we were hungry we decided to give it a chance thinking that we should not judge it by its looks. We ordered superstar dosa and veg noodles. Dosa was super thin and had raw onions. Sambhar was more on a sweeter side and the coconut chutney had string garlic taste. I am not sure how they came up with this disaster recipe. Veg noodles were blend. Overall this place is filthy and serves overpriced food with horrible taste. I was planning to bring my friend to this place but after this experience I wont recommend this to anyone. Don't spend your time and money on this place. Not worth it.

As soon as I watched it, I asked if they could turn down the music, they did. I told them I'm waiting for my party and they'll order for me that I was vegan and if they could cook accordingly I did have a chickpea dish, but they drizzled some sort of white sauce on it. Fear of being yogurt. I took it off the top and rice And Samosa were delicious. The prices were decent and people seem to be happy with their choices. The gentleman next to Me received looked like a giant burrito I was impressed my friend ordered some type of wrap that had too much of one ingredient in it and said it was uneditable. The downside is they do not have tofu, so don't offer vegan options for protein other than a chickpea, but an experience. I'm glad I had.

Not impressed. Went with high expectations but most of the food we ordered was not made from scratch ( frozen food microwaved) and wait time was north of 40 mins.

The food here is fine but every time I go in there's a new thing on their menu that isn't true. Prices keep being different, they refuse to sell things they have that are on the menu because they aren't offering that combo today, etc. it just makes it hard to order.

I had heard this place was good. It was not. Got a lamb curry that was more salt than lamb. The first time I can recall that I've spit food out it was so disgusting. I doubt I'll be ordering from here again. They also seem to use Doordash to fulfill orders. Doordash managed to deliver the dish about 2.5 hours after I ordered, and well over an hour after they said they would deliver. Overall, the worst dining experience I have had in Boston so far.

Visited here on a recent trip to Boston. The location is nice. Seating is a bit limited but I ordered takeout so it wasn't a big deal. I ordered the samosa chaat since I was missing home. It was good! Not astounding but not bad. For the price could have been a bit better but I understand all restaurants have raised their prices recently. I would definitely order it again if you're looking for a simple chaat as a light meal.

Tiny Indian place right next to Post office square building. Taste wise its just ok. Have tried better places in the area. Their décor is cool. Serving size is good too. Liked their dahi puri. Overall its average. Their service is good though.

I've been ordering from Vaanga since the first week it opened. The guys are all so nice and the space is fun and unique (hand painted decorations, etc) but the quality of the menu items is inconsistent. I'd generally rate it between a 3.5 and 4. Sometimes it's excellent, and sometimes it's just okay. I tend to order the same thing frequently (butter chicken, palak paneer). The butter chicken is usually the best one around -- they get a good char on the meat. However, the past few times I've had it, the sauce has been way too sweet. One thing I do really like about their food is that the cooks often use whole spices (I've gotten whole cumin seeds before) and the flavors are usually excellent. However, even when I order the same things over and over they rarely taste like the same dish! Over COVID they stopped making trays of food luncheon-style. Overall this has been good for the quality, since it's all made fresh to order instead of sitting in troughs for serving.

I had a fine lunch here. I would come back to try it again. Four of us wandered in before the lunch rush at noon to try out the new Indian place. Not every meal was ready to serve immediately, so my coworker decided to wait for his Angry Tacos to be prepared. They definitely forgot about him as other people got their tacos first. Twenty minutes later, he got his food after bugging the guys. He did enjoy the tacos after they came out. I was interested in the Volcano Chicken but not interested in waiting for it to be prepared. Instead I chose the Bombay Chicken. It was spiced well and had a nice ratio of rice to non-rice. Of course you are guaranteed a good ratio when they serve your food in a two compartment plastic container! I don't mind cheating that way though! (after all I'm going to reuse the container at home!) I will have to come back again and try out some different meals. For now I am intrigued by Vaanga but still not sure if it will become a go-to spot for me.

Visited Vaanga 2times during my trip to Boston. 1st visit on 27th June 2023 and 2nd visit on July 3 2023 27th visit- excellent visit. Good food. Welcoming staff. Especially liked the chapati and Kadai paneer very soft. The fried rice was also good. Guntur mirchi bomb was average. July 3 2023- ordered Dabba dal, pav bhaji and Paneer massage initially. I made a special request to have dabba dal to be very mild for the kids but it turned out to be very spicy. Even wife couldn't eat it. People at front desk were rude and didn't acknowledge their mistake. Paneer was average. Pav bhaji was very good. Ambiance on July 3 was crowded. The same guy who cleaned the table went back and started preparing food. The people who were preparing the food were eating while they were preparing. Not clean. No public restrooms- this is needed for people with small kids. Waiters and people who work in billing should be thought basic customer service. I felt disappointed with the visit on July 3.

Welcome addition for Indian snack foods in Downtown Boston! I only had the appetite to try the dahi poori, which was good (although I felt there were one or two spices missing, probably kala namak). Luckily I came on the cusp of the Tamil new year, and so I had the pleasure to enjoy their complementary sweet Pongal. Having just returned from Bangalore a week ago, I can say it tasted spot on.

If you're going to dine in at the place, bring a mountain of patience. It took us an hour to get merely 2 chaats. And they were not even that good.

The kothu partha here is very spicy however the portion size is very huge for 1 person to fjnish

Very disappointed. Too expensive. Not get enough quantity for the food. Very thin super masala Dosas.

The place is a good take out place. There is long wait at dinner time. I ordered dosa and the taste was very descent. Ambiance is ok. There are a few tables to seat if like to get a quick bite. Quantity is sufficient. Prices are a bit high for takeout but I guess its downtown Boston. I would recommend the place.

Phenomenal flavors! Going to order again tomorrow! Had the paneer butter masala & chicken Masala which was delicious. Best samosa we've ever had and the naan was amazing!

Waited 45mins for my order along with everyone else... A full dining room of people, and nobody eating anything because the kitchen was far to slow. When I finally received my food the chicken had bones/cartilage suggesting to me that the quality is sub par overall. The staff has no idea what is going on, they just kept walking back and forth looking in empty bags (orders to be filled) as if someone might have suddenly added food to them. And when the food does become available they either didn't call the person's name, or called it so quietly noone could hear. I was sitting closest than anyone and I still couldn't hear what they were saying. I don't think food service is their forte. Never going back.

the food here is soo authentic and good! i love the superstar dosa, idly, butter chicken, and biryani. service from doordash is fast but it could get very very busy at the restaurant (that's when you know it's good) but that means the wait can be long. definitely want to try everything on the menu

Over a year later Vaanga still is the absolute best place in Greater Boston for Indian food and this is no exaggeration. I'm writing this review to highlight their contributions to the healthcare community in the time of the COVID crisis. I'm a resident doctor at Tufts Medical Center and despite all the ups and downs that came with being a doctor during COVID times, one of the biggest highlights of those times was the day Vaanga/Godavari delivered all of us free lunch! The donation itself was an extremely kind and conscientious gesture, much appreciated. But that wasn't all, as always, even in a simple lunch the food was just divine, from the authentic sambar rice to the very flavorful chicken and jeera rice. It made getting through another taxing day so much easier! These guys aren't just another Indian restaurant. They really care about the community and they show it in the best possible way - by feeding frontline workers food that is totally on another level! As I write this Vaanga has an aggregate review of 3 stars which is by far not reflective of how awesome and authentic the food here is! And, it's certainly not reflective of how generous they are to the community! Boston, give Vaanga your business whenever you crave Indian food, it's quite simply the best.

Bad food! Portions are small and taste of the food does not compensate it as well. Please avoid!

Excellent Tasty South Indian Food ! Amazed with the quality! Very good service. Keep up the good service!