Jewel In The Crown - Dumfries Galloway

I recently visited an Indian restaurant for the first time with my colleagues from Holywood Service Station in Dumfries for our Christmas night out. The food was delicious and the service from all the staff was top-notch.

We were warmly welcomed into the clean and beautifully lit restaurant. The food was delicious and we all left feeling satisfied. Thank you.

On our final evening in Castle Douglas, we decided to get takeout. We had ordered takeout from the Chinese restaurant nearby on our first night there. Unfortunately, The Jewel did not meet our expectations or live up to the previous reviews. The food, although plentiful, was bland and greasy. I have had better ready-made meals. I am disappointed to leave a negative review as I had been excited to try their food all week.

Beyond awful! The vegetable pakora was tasteless and didn’t hold together it was nothing more than shredded deep fried pieces of batter. Reminded me of what you might find if you emptied out the remnants of your deep fat frier. The disappointment continued when we realised we’d only been given half a curry! A long foil dish that was less than half filled (no exaggeration! . I can only assume the chef got hungry half way through cooking it? My recommendation to the chef would be to try one of the Asda’s savers curries instead as it has miles more taste and at least you can be assured a full portion. The spiced onions come in a small tub a similar size to a McDonald’s ketchup sauce. To be fair, they were only 95p, but I’ve never received spiced onions as a ‘dip’ before! The one plus I would say is the customer service, the person on the phone was very courteous and eager to help. If they could back this up with the food they produced they’d be onto a winner. We’re not the type to leave reviews but this was genuinely awful and we’ve been left hungry and out of pocket. Maybe we caught them on a bad night, but I’d recommend giving this a miss.

We had a delivery from here and it was not great. 2 of the 3 main courses were average, with the sauce for one being runny, insipid and glowing yellow, the other being too spicy after being advertised as not. The third main was a glowing red, tasty, but glowing. The move away from artificial colouring has not reached this premises. The side dishes were fine and the delivery in good time. The naans were huge. The papadums and chutney trays were fine. Perhaps we caught them on an off day.