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Overall rating:

It's a pancake, really. A crepe. Nothing more.

Becky Stein/Special (ENLARGE)
The avial curry at MGR Palace.
Becky Stein/Special (ENLARGE)
The thali is a selection of different foods served with bread.
Becky Stein/Special (ENLARGE)
Gulab jamun is a dessert of fried dough served in sugar syrup and flavored with cardamom.
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The batter is made with a pureed mixture of dal (lentils) and rice, left to ferment. Sometimes it's made with semolina. With a consistency similar to heavy cream, the batter is spread on a griddle, then crisped until paper thin and golden brown. The flavor is a mixture of tangy sourness and sweet dough, and when filled with paneer or potatoes and onions (called masala), it is the stuff of lustful longings.

Often eaten for breakfast in India, the dosa is perhaps the most well-known South Indian dish outside of India.

And nobody griddles them up better than Nanjunda Ram, the chef-owner of newly opened MGR Palace (the MGR stands for Madras Sri Ganesh Ram), at the Wal-Mart shopping center at Rockbridge Road in Stone Mountain. Ram was the griddle master at Madras Saravana Bhavan in Decatur before it closed (it's scheduled to reopen Oct. 18 as part of a franchise from Chennai, India).

Indian menus in the Atlanta area are starting to woefully remind me of the demise of Chinese menus — they offer a little too much of something for everyone. MGR Palace certainly falls prey to this bit of ill-placed logic. The difference is that almost everything here is worth a taste, even if, like the saag paneer dosa — a thin, lacy dosa filled with cubes of soft farmer cheese and spinach — the origins are a bit suspect. Saag paneer, a spinach-and-mustard-seed curry with cheese, is a classic North Indian dish, while dosai are classically from the South. So while the lines of latitude and longitude might not meet, the result is something really good to eat. Think of it as a yummy hunk of Yankee pot roast wrapped up in a buttermilk biscuit. What's not to like?

If you were a big Madras groupie (and there were many of us), the menu will seem pretty familiar: medhu vadai, a favorite, is just as fun here — a crispy doughnut-like goodie made of white lentil and studded with bits of black peppercorns and ginger. When dipped in spicy mint chutney, it's a fun way to start the meal, unless you decide to break open tiny pani puri (little crispy crunchy puffs) and fill them with an array of potatoes, chickpeas and tamarind chutney before popping them in your mouth.

Some things, such as the bhel puri (which is actually a Mumbai street food), are better here: puffed rice, bits of chickpea flour noodles, cilantro, onions and potatoes mix it up big time with a heap of spicy chutney. There's thali, too, with incredible dal curries, rice, raita and rice kheer, a favorite sweet dish that's sort of like a runny rice pudding chock-full of raisins and laced with warm cardamom.

Like Madras, MGR is a vegetarian restaurant, so there's nothing from the tandoor except breads — steamy, puffy tufts of wheaty puri and bubbly, blistered naan, the latter not as richly layered in flavor or texture as I remember from Madras. (Then again, I never met a carbohydrate I didn't like.)

Smaller than Madras, the surroundings are sparse, with half the number of tables and an area for a lunch buffet (another calamitous creation that for some reason proves popular with patrons but not with critics; not this critic, anyway). Still, as a whole the space is infinitely more likable than the former Folks spot that Madras occupied simply because it's not as overwhelming. The kitchen gets things to the table a little slowly, and management was still trying to get a liquor license as of last week (the restaurant opened Labor Day weekend).

But if comparison is one of the highest forms of flattery, MGR Palace can rest easy. There's no other Indian restaurant like it, even the one it used to be.

MGR PALACE

Food: Indian Vegetarian

Service: One or two guys, and the kitchen can be slow

Address, telephone: 1825-14A Rockbridge Road, Stone Mountain, 770-413-1415

Price range: $-$$

Credit cards: Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover

Hours of operation: Open for lunch and dinner daily from 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Lunch buffet is 11:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.

Best dishes: Medhu vadai, any of the dosai, saag paneer, thali dishes, gulab jamun, puri, avial curry, bhel puri

Vegetarian selections: All vegetarian

Children: Absolutely. There is a section of dosai just for kids.

Parking: Adjacent lot

Reservations: For six or more

Wheelchair access: Yes

Smoking: No

Noise level: Low

Patio: No

Takeout: Yes

Website: None yet

KEY TO RATINGS
Outstanding: Sets the standard for fine dining in the region.
Excellent: One of the best in the Atlanta area.
Very good: Merits a drive if you're looking for this kind of dining.
Good: A worthy addition to its neighborhood, but food may be hit or miss.
Fair: The food is more miss than hit.
Restaurants that do not meet these criteria may be rated Poor.

Pricing code: $$$$$ means more than $75; $$$$ means $75 and less; $$$ means $50 and less; $$ means $25 and less; $ means $15 and less. (The price code represents a meal for one that includes appetizer, entree and dessert without including tax, tip and cocktails.)