Sagar

I really like the sagar chain, the food is great and they have a good choice of different Indian cuisines. For me as a vegetarian these places re the best because you can try various starters and have a mixed dish whereas many other restaurant have one veggie option and that’s it. I warmly recommend it. And the staff was always friendly

Right at the start, let me make it clear that there are some things that Sagar is brilliant for and some are just not as good as the originals.
Sagar is a very famous chain in South India and Bombay for amazing South Indian /​Udupi style vegetarian cuisine — this includes dosas, idlis, vadas etc.
This Sagar is not a part of that chain, but they say that their chefs are from Udupi and that cuisine is their specialty
Conversely, from my experience, the North Indian style food was extremely good and the Udupi cuisine was middling.
Can’t wait to be home in a week and eat 6 feet long butterpaper thin crispy dosas for less than 2 pounds.
I wanted to take away some Vegetarian Indian food, which was why I had come here, but when I saw the dosas on the menu, I could not resist. I gave my takeaway order and asked for a paper masala dosa to eat in.
Problems:
1. The dosa was clumpy. Part of the dosa was thin and some parts were just too soft and thick.
2. The dosa was half cold by the time it arrived at my table.
3. The masala that was served separately had something marginally off — it definitely wasn’t fresh and seemed to be reheated from the refrigerator after a couple of days. Traditional Udupi masala would have only potatoes. This was a mish mash of carrots, peas, potatoes and paneer.
4. The chutneys (I asked for the extra red chutney) were served cold from the fridge. Ideally they should be served at around 24C temperature.
5, The sambhar wasn’t piping hot, it was lukewarm. And note that this is Udupi style slightly sweetish sambhar, not the fiery Tamilian sambhar, so it desperately needs that boiling temperature.
If I had just eaten the dosa here, I would have rated this place a 1 or a 2, Why then the high rating of 4? Its for their North Indian food.
The Channa bhatura was the best I have eaten in London. If bhaturas (fried bread made from white flour) is too heavy for you, just order the channa (chickpea) masala with parathas, it is outstanding!
The aloo gobhi masala (potato & cauliflower) was amazing and the little bit leftover, kept well for a week in the fridge.
The dahi vada (fried lentil balls soaked in yoghurt) was also very good.
The parathas were almost home made
But the absolute cherry on the icing of the cake was the gajar ka halwa (carrot dessert)
The dosa was a major disappointment, but I’d go back for the North Indian food any day.
Strangely for a so called Udupi restaurant, they have a full bar. Wonder what the purists would think about that. LOL

This is the place to go for authentic South Indian «tiffin» preparations. I usually visit London twice a year and always make it a point to visit Sagar. I have tried their dosas, idlys and vadais all served with sambar and coconut chutney — absolutely delicious!
The Semiya payasam also tastes good but is a bit on the watery side. Haven’t tried the other items on their menu.
I should also mention that their toilets are the cleanest that I have seen in an Indian restaurant in this price range.

I adore Sagar ~ and love the quality and variety of dishes, as well as its friendly wait staff. A must try!

Summary based on one lunch and one dinner:
–above average food
–inexpensive, especially lunch special
–friendly service
Recommended in this immediate area

Sagar serves PROPER Indian food, none of that take-​away rubbish!
It’s fully vegetarian and have a whole separate menu for vegans, I was spoilt for choice!
I started with Medu Vada (lentil doughnuts) which were cooked to perfection! You get two medium sized ones and after finishing them I sort-​of regretted getting a starter as they were quite filling… especially when I saw the size of my main dish (it was then that my dad, who’d picked the restaurant, informed me that he’d heard they have «generous portions»).
I had a Masala Dosa for my main, and it was so big that it didn’t fit on the plate! It was luke warm when it arrived so was cold by the time I got around to finishing it all. I guess I either need to eat faster or they need to make sure the food is a bit hotter. It wasn’t spicy at all so I recommend a Masala Dosa if you’re not used to Indian food.
The service was good although not as friendly as other places. I’m guessing they’re not used to having goths in there! Either that or they overheard my dad’s constant complaints that there was no meat! (He was the one who chose the place and he knew it was vegetarian!).
They have toilets downstairs, which were immaculate. I don’t know if they have any accessible toilets at this venue so it might be worth asking before you visit if you have mobility issues.
They have three venues in London and I wouldn’t hesitate to visit any of them; the food was wonderful, definitely generous portions and very reasonably priced. Great authentic Southern Indian food :)

If you are vegan, gluten-​free or nut-​free, they have special menus! You just need to ask.
I was excited to go back, as I enjoyed my visit the Covent Garden location. They do have a crazy cheap weekday lunch special, but if you haven’t memorised it from the sign outside, they’re not going to mention it to you inside.
Service was prompt, and I was cold and hungry and really looking forward to a hot South Indian meal. I was overly excited to get the killer homemade Punjabi samosa! I would eat them all day long. They were very good. Which is what makes the rest of the meal so sad.
The rest of the food took awhile and it was lukewarm when it did come. I had a massive dosa with an ice-​cream scoop size of potatoes inside. Really? Pretty disappointing. The aloo ghobi was fine, but nothing special for the price.
The people around us seemed to be loving their meals and talking with the staff. I don’t know if we just had a bum meal or what. But I won’t be rushing back here. I’ll go back to the Covent Garden branch first.

Good staff, good service, fairly priced and authentic South Indian fare… Can’t expect more. Must try Mango Lassi and Medu Vada. My personal favourite is the bakalabath.

We were at Tottenham Court Street walking towards another restaurant when we walked by Sagar. «South Indian Vegetarian Cuisine» caught our eye. We had a delicious, quiet and relaxed meal at 4 pm during the Christmas rush. Good service. After a warm lintel broth we shared the Rajdani Thali, a north indian dish of pappadam, bhajia, raitha, vegetable kurma, channa masala, mutter paneer, aloo gobi, pillau rice, chappathi and dessert. Yummy! We would go back again.

Very good lunch place, either eat in or take away — both with dedicated £5.95 & £3.5 offers on a menu that includes two curries (the tofu and peas one is great, the other one not so much) salad, rice and pita bread. It’s a vegetarian with great value for money and well located. Service was quick and pleasant — recommended if you have any lunch time indian food cravings like myself!

I was very happy with the service and also the food. The taste was good and fresh quality ingredients seem to be used in the preparation. Good place and hope to visit them again in the near future. It also helps to know that they are located at a place that I frequent often.

The Englishman brought me here during the launch of the City Hawk app for a free meal. We arrived right at the very end of the night, just before they were closing but they never rushed us. In terms of generosity in London, the staff at Sagar are the most generous. They were very nice and checked in to make sure everything was great throughout the meal. I never thought they were hovering. I had my reservations about dining for free (as that is most times pretty dodge), but the food we enjoyed was superb! Everything was so fresh and the portion sizes very generous. I hope more people check out Sagar for some lovely, affordable vegetarian food in Central. I would definitely stop in again.

I’m reviewing Sagar as a takeaway lunch spot. It looks like a pleasant veggie Indian, but they also do a fairly brisk trade in lunch boxes for a very reasonable £3.50. My Indian colleague is a fan so they must be doing something right. You get a small salad, roti, lentils, rice, and veggie curry, all served in a prison-​style tray with separate spaces for each item. All in all a very dependable little lunch option.

I have to say I had some reservations regarding this place. Indian plus vegetarian somehow does not combine well in my mind. However, I was already invited at Sagar and it would be rude to decline my friend; in addition, I was actually rather interested and curious how would they feed me properly with only veggies.
My adventure started when I entered and was greeted by the staff. The place looks quite nice on the inside and we were seated almost immediately. The menu was quite rich and we had a bit of hassle choosing but we finally stopped on some items.
Beware that one cannot just pass up on ordering the curry if eating here. It was delicious and so flavourful, I loved it. I also liked how the food is served — those cute metallic pots are adorable.
The guys have an awesome restaurant going on there and I would even recommend it to the meat lovers, they could have a nice dinner eating only veggies.

On the whole, this was a disappointing experience. The waiter messed up our order multiple times because he didn’t write anything down and we felt quite hovered over by the waitstaff during our meal (I felt like they were eavesdropping).
The paapdi chaat was so-​so. My onion rava masala dosa was cold. However, I do want to say that their lassi was superb, and their gulab jamun was nice and hot, which I really appreciated.
Overall, I feel bad not giving them a better rating, given their great lassi and gulab jamun, but «Meh. I’ve experienced better» accurately sums up my sentiments, so I’m going to have to go with 2 stars, even though I sense that I may have just had an off experience.
Tip: this is close to the Odeon, so not a bad place for a cheap meal post-​movie.

I’m sad. After 15 hours of work I demanded gastro-​happiness and was let down. Maybe I was expecting too much. Maybe I ordered the wrong dishes going for some North Indian dishes alongside some from the South. But I wasn’t pleased with what I had.
Rasam — Too thick. I should have gone next door for more Keralan style food.
Fried Idlys were good. The saving grace.
Channa Batoora didn’t have any kind of wow taste to it. The Batoora had one side a bit undercooked. It could also have been the soggy-​ness of all the oil…
The plates looked like from a cheesy restaurant in India with ‘sagar’ written in a boring font. White plates.
The staff assumed I knew Tamil and started talking to me in tamil. I believe I disappointed them as well.

If you want to try a real authentic South Indian food, this is the place. try their Dosas, Upama, followed by a filter coffee. Very authentic south Indian filter coffee !
I also tried their ‘chat’ foods. which is Bhel Puri, Sev Puri… really very authentic, make me feel nostalgic!

Lentils make me poop. Growing up as a vegetarian, I didn’t know this and the doctors all said I had serious IBS. TMI
I now eat meat but miss good ol’ veggie food just like my mum would cook. As a result, Sagar feels like home.
They do a killer Thali and you’d be bonkers to try anything else. Saying that, they do a budget lunch box for under a fiver. It’s sexy tasty but lentil heavy so this little lady has to stay away.
No, seriously this veggie place kicks ass. It’s good value for money with great service and in a fantastic location away from the tourists. It’s not classy though, even though they have now opened up a little cocktail bar below. It’s full of Indian people, eating Indian food, yup, it’s pretty damn authentic.

I’m torn between 3 and 4 stars… what to do? Shall I round up, or round down???
I ate here on Saturday night, for my birthday. I booked in advance although as it turns out it wasn’t too busy. The tables of four are set very closely next to each other, so when the waitress showed me my table, a vision of me and my friends laughing loudly and annoying the surrounding tables flashed into my head and I think that must have shown on my face, as she then suggested another table further down the back of the restaurant!
The menu has a good range of dishes, including Uthappams (lentil ‘pizzas’) and the vegetable thali which was the star of our show. I ordered vegetable kurma as it sounded lovely with delicate spices and cashew nuts. It was perfectly nice, but not sensational and arrived at the table warm rather than hot. The remaining two of the party ordered aloo gobi and an aubergine and okra curry. I think we were all a little surprised by the portion sizes — they’re small, probably perfect if you have a starter, but we had saved ourselves for the main. We could have done with a couple of extra dishes to share between us.
The breads were very good, one sort (can’t remember what it was called) was a quite oily but very delicious.
Our waiter was funny (intentionally) and the service was good. The wine was surprisingly nice. I don’t know why that’s surprising, but house wines can be touch and go I suppose.
Only other thing to mention is that it was a bit bright in there. It could have done with some more flattering lighting, especially as I was there on my *ahem… number deleted* XXth birthday!
I think if you’re in the area, you could do much worse that to stop here for a bite to eat, however we travelled in from outside London so perhaps Sagar was unfairly under pressure to perform.

Sagar came highly recommended last year on Happy Cow, shortly before Unilocal invaded London, as a hotspot for authentic South Indian vegetarian cuisine.
I was more than eager to try out Indian food in London proper as I had heard so many good things about it. I thought to myself there was no way coming from a multicultural city like Toronto that I’d be able to find better Indian food overseas, but alas, I was wrong!
We ordered several dishes to share, including Chana Masala, Saag Paneer and Vegetable Korma, plus the most monstrous portion of Naan ever. I’m not even kidding — the size of this naan eclipsed my own skull. I am still laughing about it six months later.
Service was impeccable and friendly. Prices were reasonable. The flavour of the food was surreal — I was in a curry coma for the rest of the night!