"Udupi is kind of small and the Sunday night we were there it was packed. There were a number of families with small children, and it was pretty noisy.
We ordered the Punjabi Thali and the dosai platter. They both come with appetizer, soup, and an entree (or, for the thali, a whole bunch of little options on a tray). Very good value. The mulligatawny soup was nice and a bit salty. The hot and sour soup was a bit spicy for me - didn't finish it. Both our dishes came with sambar, a tasty broth type soup with pieces of something a little like potato in it, but not quite.
The dosai platter comes with your choice of dosai, a type of crispy wheat/lentil pancake (think Indian crepe) with filling. The pancake is 18" to 24" long. The samosa which came with it was tasty (your choice of tamarind sauce, sambar, or coconut chutney). There was also a steamed lentil/rice bread, which was tasty with a texture a little like cream of wheat.
I was a little disappointed with my thali, as it was pretty much like any thali I'd had any place else. It was good enough, but the dosai was enough of a revelation, as were the excellent appetizers, that even though it was good, it paled by comparison. Thali's always seem to come with a creamed spinach dish I'm not crazy about, though it was pretty good cold the next morning.
If you get the tea, get the masala tea. It's similar to what coffee houses sell as chai, except you get to decide how much to sweeten it.
Sadly, naan, the fluffy white bread one gets at most Indian places, must not be south Indian, as it was nowhere on the menu. The roti that came with the thali was OK and the papad was pretty tasteless.
Service was attentive, the food came quickly, and the platters were good value, though I think next time we'll both get dosai, or get one dosai and the appetizer platter and then split it. Plenty of leftovers, which the staff was happy to pack up into 5 or 6 tiny containers, which made for a good lunch the next day, too."
