You don’t have to join, and nothing about the place, wedged into a corner across from the Clarendon Metro, suggests exclusivity. It’s the passionate, detail-minded cooking that puts Delhi Club in select company as one of the few Indian places around that please the palate and don’t pinch the pocketbook.
The restaurant is the smaller, younger sibling of Bombay Curry Company. There’s overlap in the menus, but where Bombay Curry Company excels in meats, Delhi Club excels in vegetables. The paneer—house-made cheese—is a standout, served as saag paneer (with creamy spinach) or in a tomato sauce scented with cardamom, cloves, ginger, garlic, and dried fenugreek leaves.
Don’t ignore the lamb dishes: The chops are juicy, thick, and insinuatingly spiced, the seekh kebab is ground in-house with just the right amount of fat, and the rogan josh is simmered in a spicy sauce with onions and tomatoes. The breads are good, particularly the five types of nan, one topped with chopped garlic, another stuffed with ground lamb.
The $9.95 weekend lunch buffet features a dozen or more dishes, including multiple preparations of lamb, chicken, fish, and vegetables.
Open daily for lunch and dinner.
Ann Limpert joined Washingtonian in late 2003. She was previously an editorial assistant at Entertainment Weekly and a cook in New York restaurant kitchens, and she is a graduate of the Institute of Culinary Education. She lives in Petworth.
