The owner of a new restaurant in Timmins says he didn’t expect such an overwhelming response from the community.
Darshan Chaudhari and his wife Suchi are the owners of Mango Delight. The restaurant serving Indian food had a soft opening Friday, Oct. 1.
Chaudhari said the overwhelming, “totally unexpected” response led him to make a tough decision to temporarily reduce hours of operations.
“I feel I’m not able to satisfy my customers 100 per cent,” he said. “I don’t want my customers to wait even for two minutes. If we make them wait, I don’t think we give them our 100 per cent.”
The restaurant will be serving dinner only from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m., Monday to Saturday.
Walk-in and phone orders will be accepted. Online ordering and delivery through SkipTheDishes will be halted for now.
Chaudhari said he had to limit the hours to run the operation smoothly and satisfy the customers.
“I feel bad. Even if a customer is satisfied only 90 per cent, we’re missing 10 per cent and that 10 per cent is a huge distance,” Chaudhari said. “We don’t even want to do 99 or 98 per cent. We want to do 100 per cent at whatever we do.”
The restaurant employs three full-time kitchen staff and five part-time front staff. Chaudhari said there are not enough employees to offer dine-in services at the moment. He is also looking to hire a chef who can work on a tandoori oven.
The staff have never worked at an Indian restaurant before and Chaudhari is training them on how to take orders and deal with customers.
“Even a slight confusion messes up many things in the back,” he said. “Everything should be done in assembly, in a smooth manner.”
The owners moved to Timmins from Saskatchewan in June. Chaudhari, who wanted to run his own business, previously worked at an Indian restaurant in Saskatchewan and as a radio frequency engineer in the United States.
In January, he visited to look at the building and liked the location. Mango Delight is operated out of the same location where another Indian restaurant, Holy Cow, used to be.
"We're only choosing the City of Timmins because this city has something special. And the city has a lot of potential," Chaudhari said. "And together we can prove something. We can touch unimaginable heights, that's what I feel."
Chaudhari said he wants his customers to feel special.
“We’re here to stay. Please be patient with us," he said. "We will serve you with our 100 per cent when we’re totally ready."
Mango Delight can be found at 194 3rd Avenue. For more information, visit mangodelight.ca.
