I love this place. The food is always fresh and so good! Went here for the for the first time a few months ago for the buffet and have been a regular ever since. There is always a good variety for the buffet and the menu offers reasonable sized portions. My favourite is the lamb korma, lamb curry - as well as the shahi paneer, it's like grated cheese in a creamy tomato sauce. Add some garlic naan and I am in Indian food heaven. They also have this prawn dish sometimes in the buffet. The servers know me well so I know the tricks - like if your in a rush, you can just head to the bar after you are done eating and they'll ring you up right away. I am telling you, if you haven't been to this place you are missing out. There's a pizza place beside it, which is kinda funny - but despite that the ambiance is pretty solid. Sari's on the wall, good music, and very, very clean (most indian restaurants have some awful bathrooms, this one's good).

My girlfriend and I had decided to give Saffron a try, as we live close and from the outside, the place looks pretty inviting. There was a sign outside saying that dinner buffet was offered during the week until 9pm, and since it was 8pm we decided to go in and see what Saffron had to offer.

I have lived in this city for 27 years, and have worked in the restaurant industry for 5 of those years. Never have I had an experience in a 'fine dining' establishment that was this bad. I have eaten at many, many Indian restaurants in town and was truly disappointed by Saffron. To start out, the ambiance was terrible. Thievery Corporation is not Indian music, and all other Indian establishments I have been in have had traditional Indian music, so this change of pace threw me off from the get go. The tables were placed very closely together which I can understand if it is countered by great food. The food is sub-par.

The service was terrible. There was little or no response at the door from the hostess, even though it didn't seem very busy. After asking us if we were eating in, the person who became our server ran to get us a table without saying a thing, leaving us standing at the entrance wondering if she had in fact been going to show us a table. This was rather awkward but we decided to follow anyway and have a seat at a table. After some wait (which was strange on a Friday night, because it seemed most of the first evening rush had left, leaving about 4 or 5 tables) the server took our order with little or no suggestion or conversation. Maybe it was a bad day, she really didn't seem helpful or interested in taking another order.

We ordered a fish pakora which came out dry - so dry not even the small serving of mint chutney could counter the dryness. In the time this took to hit the table, they had sat another table of 3 right beside us, and they had all the food they had ordered before we received our first main (maybe there's a secret word or something?) Then, shockingly, we received only one of two mains, with none of the naan or rice we had ordered. After several minutes I asked to have our naan, which came out shortly after as half of what we had actually ordered. Then our second main came out without rice, and after I asked we were brought an order of rice that wasn't the type that we had ordered. This was all very, very strange. At least time it so there are mains on the table at the same time, or bring naan as soon as a main has come out. Oh yes, and the first main was undercooked.

Never will we return to this establishment. I have never had a dining experience worse than this. We have decided to continue to order from Mezbaan, as their ambiance is unfortunate but their Indian is the best in the area. Tandoori King on Fraser near Marine still remains my favorite Indian restaurant in the lower mainland. With regards to Saffron: I would've been happier eating at subway 3 times for the same price.

Went for lunch today as me and the wife was in the vicinity and from what i heard from my wife, she tried their buffet ages ago with her friends and it was yummy. it was also starting to snow and we thought a nice spicy dish would go with the mood.
Well maybe it was yummy ages ago but not so today.

13+ dollars and most of their items are some sort of vegetable dish prepared with different color curry sauce.

Butter chicken was so so. The dish which says beef curry was in fact beef ball curry.The beef ball was cut into pieces to resemble beef chunks i suppose.
Naan which was brought to your table in a basket was bland and tasteless. Tandoori chicken
was just humdrum.

The only ok selection was the chicken curry. Where is the lamb curry? None of the dishes were even remotely spicy. Ok..i realize that they have to cater to different taste buds but seriously, can't they have at lest one "hot" dish. Just have to label it on the tray and whoever wish for some "hot" dish can give it a try.

Tried it once and that is enough i guess.

This restaurant has been on my to-try list for a while. I tried their lunch buffet and was impressed. High quality, freshly prepared food at a very reasonable price. There was a nice range of veggie dishes including fresh zucchini curry, cauliflower, peas and paneer etc. The meats included chicken and beef. The chicken kabob was flavourful with fresh herbs and spices. Their veggie samosa is one of the best I've had at a restaurant, I loved that it was full of sauteed onions and fresh herbs, and the wrapper was thin not doughy. I ended up getting a few samosa's to go and they were still yummy cold. Their naan is a bit different that I am used to, it seemed more like pizza dough almost but apparently they do prepare it with cream which is a nice touch. The butter chicken was good but the sauce wasn't that creamy (which is probably healthier). I liked that they had a selection of salads, including greek salad. The creamy sweet rice pudding was simply amazing, everyone at my table had seconds. I liked the yellow custard with fruits as well. Overall the buffet exceeded my expectations, the food's aren't highly spiced which is expected when not everyone can tolerate chili's. All of the dishes looked appetizing and they kept freshly refilling the buffet. This place would be excellent for those people who aren't that familiar with Indian food but would like to try it. You can also have items to go from the buffet if rushed for time. There was a steady stream of customers picking up food to-go. I can't wait to return for dinner and to try their other dishes, especially seafood! The service was really good as well, they didn't skimp out on hiring less staff. We left a very generous tip as we were pleased with our meal.

Food: for some reason, i just love the idea of tandoori chicken caesar salad and it actually tasted pretty good. samosas are excellent (but then again, i never met a samosa i didn't like) and butter chicken is awesome (again, never met butter chicken i didn't like). Nothing was too greasy, so just the way I like it. Never have room for dessert tho. Oh well! At least the food is good!

Service: We went late at night so it was a little slow. And I don't like how servers tend to hang around and watch their customers - gives me an uneasy feeling. When I went during the daytime when there were more people, the service was much better. Odd.

Ambiance: Nice and warm. Like the colours... and the bathrooms are nice and clean. Bathroom cleanliness should always be evaluated in ambiance cuz an icky bathroom = icky ambiance.

All in all, would come here again. Check the local newspapers for coupons to this place too to save yourself some moola!

We've only dined at Saffron once for dinner. Most of the time we grab lunch takeout. It is really good Indian food (a bit on the greasy side though, you can see the oil especially well when you order chili chicken for takeout). For lunch it's at around $12-$15. If we didn't have to work we would eat at the buffet.

The restaurant has good ambiance and nice candlelight dining. The server will come if beckoned but won't really be by to check on you every 10 min (just the way I like it). We also went very early and the restaurant wasn't crowded at all, so not sure what happens when it gets busy.

I recommend giving this place a try, but when we feel like dinner buffet we usually end up at Samosa Garden. Less grease.

I really like this place. The buffet has a wide selection, it is always fresh as the place is busy, and I love the food.

With the lunch buffet the service suffers because it is so busy. I would bet it would be much better in the evening.

Right from the get go, if you walk in and it is busy, they probably won't acknowledge you. When there are multiple groups waiting, this irritates me as they basically show up when a table is free and ask you "who's next?". There is plenty of room for abuse there with people trying to butt in and that would make me very very angry if it happened... not the best of mood to start a meal.

So when you get a table, I find we only get Naan about 1/3 of the time.

When you are done your meal, don't ever expect a bill. You pretty much have to go up to the counter where there is often a long wait. We usually just leave cash without getting the bill.

The servers themselves are actually nice and friendly, they just don't have time to help you.

The price is starting to creep up now too at $11 for the buffet, but I think it is still worth it. They can afford to charge it, they are still busy.

Their sidewalk sign claimed their restaurant was voted the best 3 yrs in the row. And that was reason why I paid them a visit w/ my bf. It's a nice looking restaurant, warm and welcoming. The poppadom was delicious and fresh. I ordered butter chicken w/ rice & naam. Bf ordered Tandoori chicken w/ rice. The butter chicken was good but had too much of a tomato taste. I like them creamy and flavorful. The rice was yellow and white w/ green peas. I thought that was neat. The Tandoori chicken was moist and spicy. The naam bread was left in the oven a little too long leaving the bottom a crispy and dry. Overall, it was good.

Went there for lunch today with some collegues.

The location was good, and I found meter parking available close to the location.

The restaurant ambience is nice and clean.

We all tried the buffet. Since it was my first time trying this type of food, I did nor know what to expect. The buffet choices were not too spicy. I tried the vegetable samosa, butter chicken, the beef and a bit of the other choices.

The lunch was filling, but not knowing what to expect from the taste, i rated the meal decent.

Would I return? Probably not, since Indian food was not to my taste.

I am not saying there was anything wrong with the food, service or value, not at all ... it is just not a choice I would make again.

Food is good, veg food is quite excellent.

Chicken dishes have been a touch watery, probably cos indian food can be frozen and many prepare large batches and freeze, which is ok at home, but not for $15 per entree.

These guys make money cos there are no other indian eateries around.