Saffron's Persian Restaurant Review

I am ashamed I never reviewed this gift to downtown Louisville before. Saffron's has an unassuming exterior and you've probably passed it lots of times without knowing it but read this review and immediately proceed there if you're looking for great food and are searching downtown. The interior is extremely welcoming, the mood is relaxed, and the service is impeccable. You may have a small wait for the food, enjoy yourself with company, sipping wine, Persian coffee, a cocktail, or just water, while enjoying the complimentary vegetables and pita bread, until your food arrives. It is completely worth any insignificant wait. The food is simply amazing- it has to be experienced, words cannot do it justice. Be sure to compliment the chef, he is a humble and kind man who does amazing work and deserves every compliment.

Great food and only a short walk from the Yum Center. The staff was courteous and the service was quick. My only regret is that I didn't have enough room to finish my meal. I will be returning to eat here.

Handled an unplanned party of 10 perfectly. Fantastic food, service.

My favorite Restuarant. The rack of lamb is flawless but my favorite dish is the Mahi-Mahi. Give this place a shot anytime, service is great and the food is fantastic.

Try going for lunch.. They serves lunch till 4 pm..
If you are looking for early dinner try being their even 10 mins before 4..

Good food.. Great stuff.. Nice ambience

The food is spectacular. Fantastic attention by the server. Lovely atmosphere.

I'm a student in US, we were on a trip from IN to TX. Our first stop at Saffron Restaurant at Louisville, it was my Best Persian food in one or two years. Awesome, literally the best I've ever had. The price was SHOCKINGLY LOW.

The restaurant is in downtown Louisville just outside the main strip. It is a no frills restaurant. The menu has traditional names and description for each item.
Went there on Friday evening and there were only couple of tables occupied and one server who was also working as a "host".
The hummus tasted fresh so was the eggplant dip.
I ordered the Sultani which is a beef and steak combo. I requested saffron rice which is $2 extra which I did not get and got charged for it. The food was prepped well and did had to wait too long to get served.
The dessert menu has pistachio ice cream, chocolate bomb and baklava. As delicious as the ice cream is, I would throw caution to the wind.
A must try is the Persian tea. Served in a kettle with glass tea cups.
They have a full bar (limited beer choices, liquor and wine).

Nice quiet restaurant with fantastically made food. Clean dining area and more importantly clean kitchen. We had never had Persian food before, but it seemed a lot like Mediterranean cuisine. I wasn t super hungry and got the quail appetizer that was superb, and my husband ordered the beef stew which he loved. Allen was an extremely friendly waiter who told us stories about the paintings and provided excellent service. Please check it out

I'm a picky eater and even I loved what was on my plate!

5 star service and food. Highly recommend this restaurant for delicious Mediterranean food.

Food was excellent. Service was friendly and personable. I will return when I get the chance.

Quick service and decent prices on food, good place to stop for lunch.

I was in Louisville for business and couldn't have been more pleased. I had never tried Persian cuisine and ended up eating dinner there the majority of my trip. Fantastic food and owner.

The amenity of the restaurant is very comfy and exotic! Love the tender lamb racks and baklava! Great service!

Looooove this place! The food is excellent and the atmosphere is very inviting! !

My colleague and I grabbed dinner here when we were in town for a trade show. Yum! Very clean and tidy restaurant. Great hummus. I had the veggie fesenjoon and loved it - delicious vegan option. My colleague liked his dish as well. I would definitely visit here again!

The quality and the quantity of the kabab were not good in comparison to other persian resturant I saw before.
It was not tasty at all.
The only positive part of that was its waiter. He was very polite guy.

Excellent Persian cuisine. I had the quail app and the Ghorma Sabzi. All delicious.

Wow! Such wonderful food and friendly service. The lamb shank was falling off the bone. Won't go anywhere else for Persian cuisine.

Arrived at 8:30 after driving 3 hours to eat and felt unwelcome ( According to the website open until 9:30). After being seated, we were mocked by the Asian server for being Iranian men as well as Iranian women because she says we re demanding! Ask for a alcoholic drink and was told if we finish by 9. We asked for butter for the rice and kabobs and we were told it has enough. Asked for another kabob and we were told that they have restart the oven!!! Really, the worse Iranian restaurant experience I have had in the USA. The food was just a little better than the service!!! Good luck.

Great tasting food, very reasonably priced, not crowded, excellent service,, planning to take client tomorrow

Fabulous cuisine and the service was very gracious. Look forward to returning soon.

Great value for lunch. The kabobs are excellent. Highly recommend Mike's Special.

The restaurant overall assessment >5
The service was excellent.
The food quantity was good.
The food quality was excellent.
The price was interestingly low.
I love it, and strongly recommend to everyone.

We love this place! Cant believe it's not crowded. Great food and reasonable prices. Best kept secret in Louisville! Just bc its Persian dont pass it up! Best lamb chops in town...

So delicious, great service and pleasant atmosphere.

Terrible service!! After waiting for 20 minutes at my table, I see the waiter bringing drinks to a couple who came after me. At that point I just left. There're so many really good restaurants in the area, don't waste your time here.

Have always received great food and good service every time I haven't went to this restaurant.

Very good food, service, and atmosphere. Saffron rice was amazing!

Headed there with some friends while staying in Kentucky, and I have to say the food was amazing! We ordered several dishes and they were all delicious. My friends who never have had persian food fell in love with the place, Next time we are in Kentucky we will definitely be stopping by. Service was great too!

It is a beautiful restaurant. There is some nice art on the walls and the napkins were folded fancily. The waitress was nice. The food was very good. We got stuffed grape leaves as an appetizer which were delicious. They also gave us pita bread and a bowl of green leafy stuff that was quite flavorful. I am not sure what it was but it was good. I am guessing the contents of what it was but it appeared to contain mint herbs radish and feta.
They had regular soft drinks on the menu such as sodas. But being curious I ordered the doogh for a drink. It was a fermented yogurt drink. It was very different from anything on a typical American's menu. It was ice cold, it had a salty mild cheese like flavor. It was slightly fizzy and surprisingly refreshing. It was an extremely unusual drink but I didn't dislike it.
For the entree, I got the lamb and it was really good. Often lamb has a barn like taste but it was really subtle in the dish I got it was barely there. The sauce on the lamb was amazing. It looked to be tomato based and savory but not spicy. The grilled vegetables in the dish were perfect. The dish came with rice. We also ordered the saffron ice cream for dessert. It had a pleasant floral sweet flavor.
There were other options on the menu as well such as chicken, seafood and even vegetarian items. Overall, the restaurant had great food and I would definitely recommend it to anyone wanting a nice dinner at a classy Persian restaurant. It was not a cheap dinner but the food was worth the price.

Place was good, The cost of the food was not worthy

Food was good, but waiter needs training - he carried a plate under his arm pit and sneezed without covering his mouth and didn't wash his hands.

Bland food!! We didn't finish our plate. Te setting is nice, but that's about it.

Delicious meals (love the pomegranate sauce) wonderful staff and they gave us bahklava on the house when they found out it was my birthday.

I don't know how I didn't know this place was here before but now that my wife and I have been here we will definitely be back. The food is perfectly seasoned and we were both blown away with the braised lamb dish and the vegetable curry. They brought us complimentary appitizers and ice cream after our meal! I highly recommend giving this place a try. If it was in a better location I think it would be cram packed every night. Good and quick service.

Delicious food, cooked freshly to order. Really enjoyed the fish stew.

Great food! They can handle large parties with ease. Fresh ingredients with lots of flavor!

An elegant eatery located between the Hampton Inn and The Yum! Center, Saffron was my first Persian experience. Our server was polite and the food was acceptable. There was no real wow factor but everything was beautiful if a bit bland. Maybe it was a bad night. Nothing about my experience would caution me against trying it again.

We ate the jojeh kabob dish. I have had Persian food before in Toronto and in Michigan where we are from. I read the reviews and wanted to give this place a try. I was thoroughly disappointed.
The service was poor. The food was cold and tasteless. And worst of all it was overpriced for the quality of food.
The chicken was remotely the only thing that tasted good.
I don t know what the other reviews are about, this place was no where near a 2 star let alone a 5.

Two years ago while in Louisville for the AP US History Reading my roommate took me to Saffron's - it was love at first bite! Last year, I insisted we return there - it was as excellent as the first time! I will be in Louisville again the first week of June and I will certainly be returning. My experiences have been that good. Yes, the place is unassuming, the inside isn't fancy, but is serviceable. The food is wonderful. The staff has been considerate, welcoming and understanding of my ignorance of Persian food. The Turkish Coffee?? I would go just for that! Definitely worth every one of the Five Stars!!

Really enjoyed this place, the food was good, not the best I have had but nevertheless it was good. The staff was very pleasant and welcoming.

Amazing food and great service!
We were a group of 10 and all of us received our food at a reasonable time. All types of food including stews and kebabs have good quality and cooked perfectly. Their yogurt drink was also like traditional persian yogurt drink.
It was a pleasant experience for me.

I've been going to Jack Fry's for probably 20 years, and it really is an all time classic of Louisville dining. You go here for steady favorites, not inventive modern cooking. That said, it executes very well. More classic than hip. Great place for couples.

Had the pleasure of dining here for lunch during the weekend. I enjoyed a delicious place of chicken kabob, and my husband had kefta kabob. We were both very happy with our meals, the portion sizes were very large. I do wish they'd had a lunch size portion on the weekends, since we were travelling and taking leftovers with wasn't an option.

I'd highly recommend Saffron's!

hi price & food is trouble, this resturant is not cooking the food right - it is not a Persian dish if you are looking for Persian food, they make the food proir to serving and warm it in microwave. I do not recommand it .

Had a very nice Mother s Day lunch here this afternoon. The staff was quite pleasant and the drinks were quite good, recommend the Bloody Mary and Turkish Coffee (even the Carrot Juice was tasty). Enjoyed a selection of kabobs, vegetarian stews and lamb chops. The lamb was cooked very well and the pomegranate/walnut stew was incredibly tasty but missed something in the way finishing off the flavor. Baklava was very tasty and I would recommend the ice cream which was infused with saffron, rose and pistachio for a way to complete your meal. Was quite hungry when the food came so I forgot to snap a few pics but the others in here are very true to the quality of the meal. Enjoy this place a lot and hope to be back soon!

Dinner menu is much better then lunch but still the quality of food overall is very decent.

Not very good and way to too exspensive. Resteraunt is clean and has good decor, but food is bland. Menu only offers two lamb entrees. Again very, very bland.

Just moved to Louisville and it was my first time there. I was there with my family on a Sunday night, most of us had Makhsoos , the meat was too hard to chew. The shirazi salad on the side was kinda old you could tell from the cucumbers. I wish they do not serve the salad if it is not fresh. The price was a little bit high . For makhsoos plate which comes with rice and pickles and two skewer of kabab it was 18$.
The waiter is really friendly, nice and helping. He's a hardworking man and the night we were there he was the only one taking orders and serving the food. The decorations and the music were really nice and nostalgic.
They served feta cheese, bread and a mix of parsley, green onions and radish which is common before meals. Off-street us available after 6 p.m. on weekends. The quality was OK, it didn't meet my expectations.The portion of the food is more than enough, you can share a plate because the amount of rice and kabab is enough for two or even three, but there is a sharing plate fee which I don't remember how much it was.

Came to have family dinner and try something new while in Ky, and we made a great choice. The food was amazing and the service was excellent. The other part was pictures you see online might not be on the menu, but always ask. The rack of lamb was really good. This restaurant reminded me of of Rafis in Glendale California. Definitely will be back.

This restaurant had a nice atmosphere and great food. The waitress was friendly and sociable. The appetizers could be kicked up a couple notches it felt like it was an after thought. Overall enjoyed it and will definitely be back again.

Delicious food and wonderful service! Thanks Alan for making this such a pleasant experience!

Ate here for lunch. Fantastic food, service, and very generous portion size for the price.

Great food, great atmosphere, great service with fair pricing

Very good service, excellent lamb, very good salmon and nice Sabzi to start things with.

The dish was not good and the portion was too small.

Actually should be 3 1/2 stars. Food is slightly overdone, a little dry. Portions are okay. Had the salmon. Small but adequate bottle beer selection that's overpriced. Service is good and attentive.

I got stomach ache after eating their food. The lamb shank wasn t fresh and maybe stored for days.

I don't recommend this restaurant to any one. I went there with my friend for dinner.Not only was the quality of food awful, but also it was so expensive and I was not satisfied with the dinner.

Very good food and extremely polite, friendly service. We felt like our presence was valued and we were welcomed guests. This place is truly a gem!

We did not but looked at the menu and was expensive for quick meals. It is relaxing and good options.

Good tasting food....worst service ever. Drink menu on their website is a farce as they can not actually make any of the drinks. 2 dollar up charge on bill that when asked about they didn't explain just removed....total scam. Literally had two tables filled on a Friday at 730...tells you all you need to know.

Great food and even better service! Try the beef stew...it is delicious! Also, the lavender ice cream is super good.

I had lunch in saffron during my stay in Louisville. comparing price to quality ratio, I can say that it is by far one of the best Iranian restaurants in USA. The rice is very well cooked and the ingredients are fresh. Moreover, the restaurant owner and servants are very nice and open-hearted people.

Good for Chicken Kaboob...!!! ultimate test....
Also try mutton Chops...

Friendly service, fresh ingredients, and absolutely delicious lamb!

Been going to Saffrons for years. Very expensive but the FOOD and ATMOSPHERE is WORTH EVERY penny.