When Pargat Dhillon opened a little Palo Alto storefront in 1995, Darbar joined a small band of Indian restaurants between here and San Jose. Now there are hundreds, from little chaat houses serving snacks over the counter to the upscale fusion palaces, about which Dhillon says, "They don't know much about Indian food."

Today, Darbar often wins Best Indian Restaurant, and not because of its location on an edge of downtown Palo Alto. You could happen to walk by on your way to the train station, but then you'd have the train to catch. I had only driven by for many years.

Darbar takes its place on the Best Of list because of the restaurant's special features: value, good service and a wide-ranging menu that does chicken particularly proud. Lamb, less so.

The North-South Indian menu takes a vegetarian-centric approach. There are 15 vegetarian entrees, a handful of fish/seafood entrees, and 10 lamb/chicken dishes. Even the categories take the vegetarian point of view. Lamb and chicken come under the heading "Non-Vegetarian Entrees," and the traditional combination dinners are labeled "Thali (Non-Vegetarian)" and "Thali (Vegetarian)."

At dinner, each table starts with complimentary fried potato slices and two palate-tingling sauces. The rich red chile sauce is less spicy than the green one, mint-cilantro.

Darbar's small wine list includes appropriate Californians like Fetzer Gew?rztraminer and four from India's Sula, topping out at $22 a bottle. All are available by the glass, $3.50 to $5. Our server opened the bottle and poured each of the three of us a taste. I'm not sure, but I think he would have kept trying new bottles until we were all satisfied.

Darbar's loyal fans are used to this level of service. If they want a dish that's not on the menu, the chef makes it for them.

Back at the table, tandoori mixed appetizers ($8.95) were transferred from a sizzling metal platter to a serving plate. This is a nice touch. The food doesn't continue to cook, and diners don't have to steer clear of hot metal. Juicy prawns and tender chunks of chicken, white meat and dark, bode well for tandoori entrees. Only the lamb sausage lacked oomph.

Mixed bhajias ($5.95), a sample of fried appetizers, were hot, crisp and lightly coated eggplant, potatoes and chilies. Your vegetables may vary.

South India's stuffed pancakes are pretty good, too, with crunchy edges. The lamb-filled kheema masala dosa ($6.95) gets mentioned a lot. My resident dosa fan prefers the texture of the vegetarian masala dosa ($5.95), stuffed with mashed potatoes and peas.

In the rich North Indian rice dish of lamb biriani ($13.95), chunks of lamb were a little dry.

A better choice, lightly breaded fish curry ($13.95), harmonically merged a mouthful of herbs and spices in thick gravy.

Portions are generous, especially on the combination dinners served on round thali platters. The non-vegetarian thali features good-sized bowls of lamb curry (in a gravy that was totally different from fish curry), minced lamb balls in a milder curry sauce, and rich butter chicken with shreds of tender breast meat in tomato sauce. The supporting cast includes steaming basmati rice, a large fritter stuffed with chopped lamb, smaller fried pakoras (oozing cheese or vegetables like cauliflower and eggplant), thin lentil soup, flatbread, lentil crackers, cooling cucumber-yogurt raita, sweet chutney, spicy pickles and, for dessert, soupy rice pudding.

For one of Palo Alto's few lunch bargains, the weekday buffet is no secret. Wait till 1:30 p.m. and you can have it to yourself, with Darbar's veteran chef still bringing out fresh reinforcements to 15 dishes. Even on the buffet table, tandoori chicken legs stood up nicely.