This review is dedicated to Brian Wiebe. We’ve occasionally referenced this man of mystery on our site, leaving readers confused and puzzled. We are here to clear up your confusion. Brian Wiebe is one of the most important, if not socially awkward, men of our time. He has taught us everything we need to know about Critical Thinking from his Philosphy 140.3 course at the University of Saskatchewan; namely If A=B and B=C then A=C. Actually, who are we kidding? We mostly just sat at the back of the classroom thinking critically about breasts. I still can’t believe I shelled out $43.25 to buy the textbook for that class. Anyways, check out his website and you will become enlightened.  (matty)

Unlike Matty, I did not shell out $43.25 for the textbook, deciding that my money was better spent on beer and loonies to throw at breasts at Showgirls.  Looking back critically, the beer was a good choice; the loonies would have been better spent on more beer.  Or perhaps on curry.  However, I had not yet developed my curry fetish so the curry would have gone unappreciated.  I did have a serious Doritos addiction though, so maybe that would have worked out.  To purchase my book – Ren’s Beer and Doritos Diet; Binge Your Way to a Sexier You, send us an email. (ren)

I came over to Ren’s house after work in preparation for this curry adventure. He welcomed me into his home and then immediately left the house to go to Canadian Tire. 

JACKASSES LEAVE THEIR GUESTS ALONE IN THE BASEMENT. REN LEFT ME ALONE IN HIS BASEMENT. THEREFORE, REN IS A JACKASS.  (matt)

Matt complains, but he’s got to admit, it’s been nice since he’s earned enough of my trust so that I can leave him alone in the basement and I don’t even have to use my restraints and chain him to the wall.   Now back in the day, it was a different story.  It was a lot of work to coordinate a trip to Crappy Tire.  And if I wasn’t going to be back for a while I’d have to capture a small rodent and lock it in the room with him to keep him entertained and fed…depending on his preference. (ren)

When he returned we piled up the car with some of Ren’s co-workers and made our way to Short Pants Plaza.  I think they named the strip mall after a freak laundry accident.  The restaurant is located across from Tiffin and probably serves as an overflow for lunch time curry lovers in the surrounding industrial parks of Franklin.  (matt)

To make sure we were actually going to an Indian food restaurant I pre-scouted some other reviews.  With a name like Safari Grill it could be just about anything so its best to make sure.  I was kinda hoping for a free-range shoot your own elephant and eat it kind of set-up, but that would probably be un-feasible with the price of real-estate in Calgary.  A second choice would be hunt-your-dining-companions.  I liked my chances here.  Matty is kinda slow and not too agile, and he doesn’t exercise much so I’m sure the meat’s not too stringy, so I knew I’d be dining fine.  But no luck.  Just regular Indian and East African cuisine with no special twist. (ren) 

The first thing we noticed about Safari Grill is the giant zebra skin on the wall. Pretty cool. It left me wondering what zebra curry would taste like. Soon after, I started wondering why Zebra and Zippers almost always provide the grade school pictorial depiction for the letter Zed. A is for apple, Z is for a striped horse. I always thought Zorro should be the representative for Z. Children love sword bearing latinos.  (matt)

As a Canadian hockey nut, I’ve always thought it should be Zamboni.  But I guess that’s a brand name so they might have to pay royalties.  I know….Zeppelin.  Then you could rip off all sorts of cool Led Zep imagery but not have to infringe any copyrights.   Then there’s also the zumbooruk which would be appropriate in the Indian-centric context of this webpage.  What?  You don’t know what a zumbooruk is?  (ren)

As mentioned Ren had already scoped out some of previous reviewer’s comments on Safari Grill before we went. Of note were complaints about the 15% gratuity on parties of 5 or more. Five? That’s pretty weak. And very presumptuous that the service is gonna be stellar. If a nuclear family of 5 show up at the restaurant and have a crap meal/experience, they should be given the option of tipping what they want. It reminded me of that stupid rule in Quebec where there’s a minimum tip of 1 dollar for every drink you order.  Way to empower the consumer.  (matt)

I’ve never been able to decide for sure if that “mandatory” tip is actually legally binding or not.  There have definitely been some recent restaurant experiences where I’d like to enforce a mandatory 15% deduction from the bill.  Or an involuntary spaying.  Either one would do. (ren)

We started off with some deep fried cassava with a spicy pepper sauce. Very nice. The sauce (peli-peli ) may have been a distant cousin of the Portuguese peri-peri sauce. Zippy and highly recommended.  Hoping they would use the same sauce from my main course, I went with Chili chicken with whole wheat roti.  Ren had a thali (or combination platter).  I have to say, I think Ren picked the better option. He had almost half of a tandoored chicken on his platter. My rather spiceless chili chicken on the other hand, was scant on meat.  And heavy on onion. It tasted nothing like what the dish should taste like. It was like they took one of those giant onion blossoms you get at Chili’s and stuck a small piece of chicken inside. Maybe that explains it. There was a typo on the menu. Instead of Chili Chicken, it should read Chili’s Chicken.  Always great when you’re serving someone else’s food. The rest of the food we ordered was okay but not super. My lassi was a very traditional buttermilk lassi but highly unneeded, given the lack of spice in my dish. (matt)

My thali was pretty damn good.  After some confusion while ordering it about whether or not I got to pick my 4 dishes, or if they picked for me, and whether I wanted chicken, goat, or lamb in my CHICKEN curry….they were tasty. I had the daal and muttor alu (peas & potatoes) as well as the butter chicken and karai masala.    Also as Matty mentioned I got a good chunk of tandoori chicken as well as some roti and a gulab jamin type sweet for dessert.  Mmmm….burnt milk and sugar, soaked in sugar.  Too bad matty’s chili chicken was so blah, my meal was overall worth at least 1 point more than the final score.  (ren)

After the meal, we were served some nice Lindt chocolates. Nice touch and better than those Ouzo mints your get at Broken Plate.  This was followed by Ren slipping some obscure Pat Benatar references into the conversation on the drive home.  I can always count on my good friend to turn a disappointing meal into a success somehow.  (matt)

I’d love to dazzle you with the wittiness of what I said.  But….I can’t remember.  If I actually paid attention to the words coming out of my mouth I’d probably be as offended as most of my co-workers.  I’m guessing it had nothing to do with hitting anyone with my best shot…cause that would be waaaaay too easy. (ren)

Given the choice between Safari Grill and its competitor Tiffin across the street, I’d take Safari grill any day. That being said, there are probably a lot better places I could go and be more satisfied.  We’ll give Safari a generous 7.

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