Crown of Spices opens in Levittown

Tucked back into the depths of a Levittown strip mall, the new Crown of Spices is a hidden gem spot for South Indian food. You don't see it from the road, but when you approach from the parking lot, you're greeted with an elephant sculpture wearing a bedazzled golden headdress, overlooking a Levittown park. 

You can tell that partners Ajin Sekhar and Gunasekaran Gounder are pulling out all the stops for their first restaurant in the United States, which opened last month. The partners from Tamil Nadu, India also own two separate restaurants in the Indian cities of Salem and Kanyakumari, according to Sekhar. It took them nearly two years after they leased the place to open Crown of Spices in Levittown, and in the meantime, they hired a chef from Tamil Nadu to work each recipe over and over.

The cavernous dining room has a flashy look that matches its maximalist menu, which spans more than a dozen pages and will have your head spinning by the time you reach the biryani section. Thalassery fish curry, Andhra fish curry, Gongura mutton curry ... many of these hard-to-find dishes hail from the southernmost states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu, which is a tropical region with dishes sharing some similarities to Sri Lankan cuisine.

Crown of Spices' Instagram is filled with dishes cooked and served in large banana leaves, including thali meal combo platters and even a street food dish called kizhi parotta that's almost like a curry sandwich. Sekhar says the Indian banana leaves impart a special flavor and aroma to each dish. 

They hadn't yet started serving some of these dishes during a recent lunch, but the one I was able to get was so epic, I've been chomping at the bit to come back and try more. The fish pollichathu ($19.99) is an iconic recipe from Kerala, which involves rubbing a whole fish in a fiery masala paste before wrapping it in a banana leaf and throwing it on the grill. The pomfret fish arrives at the table bundled up inside this leaf, which is crackled from the grill and piping hot to the touch. Handling the steaming hot fish inside is a challenge, but once you get some of the meat off the bones and onto your fork, it's a wild ride of chili and earthen spices. 

Sekhar says they grind their spices from scratch, and you can tell the difference in the curries, which taste fuller and fresher than your usual fare. A thalassery fish curry ($21.99) is a gut punch of tangy tamarind and coconut milk, which is typical of Southern Indian cuisine. And the mutton chettinadu ($21.99) doesn't shy away from using the bonier pieces of the goat, drowned in a thick curry that's so dark with spices it looks like mortar. 

To soak it up, the kitchen also prepares an array of Southern Indian breads, including one called nool parotta, which manages to be both flakey and stringy. Sekhar says the bread is handmade back in the kitchen and cut into small strings that you can pull off in a satisfying way. This wasn't listed on the menu, another reason why it helped to ask the server to guide you. 

Crown of Spices, 54 E. Village Green, Levittown, 516-212-5555, crownofspices.com. Open 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Saturday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Sunday, closed Monday.