Tiffin, the ubiquitous Indian food joint that delivers across the city and seems to open a new outpost every three months, is going to be four years old this December. Four! Realizing that makes me feel a little bit like a parent asking her child “What's a Lady Gaga, and why does it wear all of those muppets?” Basically: the march of time is going way too fast.

Tiffin still feels new to me, even though I've been ordering from it since it first opened in 2006. At the time, I was living in Fishtown, and although there were good restaurants in the area, delivery options were limited to Chinese and pizza. If my boyfriend and I craved Indian food, we would take the El out to West Philly and proceed to eat three meals worth at once, filling our curry reserves like camels slurping water into their humps before trekking across the desert. So when I heard about an Indian restaurant opening at 7th and Girard, I was thrilled. And not only did Tiffin bring Indian food to 7th and Girard, but the food it brought was good. Really good. Good enough to win the Indian category for the 2007 Best of Philly, and good enough for Craig LaBan to complain more about Tiffin's website and strange Ikea tables than its food.

Like many others, I fell in love with Tiffin and happily ordered vegetable kormas and naans, potato-filled samosas and various vindaloos. Then, one day in mid-2008, a sign showed up on Girard even closer to my house: Ekta Indian Cuisine. One of Tiffin's former chefs, Raju Bhattarai, had left to start his own place, and I was quickly smitten. Not only was Ekta closer, but it also had similarly excellent food and, moreover, everything was cheaper than Tiffin. Ekta, I decided, knew how to treat me right.

So I started going steady with Ekta. When I moved a few blocks away to a house that was equidistant from the two restaurants, I didn't even give Tiffin my new address. Things went on like this for almost two years. But recently… well, I started thinking about Tiffin. It's not that I was dissatisfied with Ekta, and I certainly meant it no disrespect. But like a happily married woman who wonders what could have been, I thought about Tiffin in hazy lunchtime daydreams. How was it doing? Was it better than ever? Did it ever think about feeding me?

Rather than just wondering if my life might be better with Tiffin and risking expensive Indian-food-relationship-therapy later in life, I decided to face my questions head-on with a Tiffin versus Ekta challenge. I ordered the exact same meals – saag paneer, vegetable samosas, garlic naan, and chicken tikka masala – from both restaurants at the exact same time. Both restaurants quoted me a delivery time of an hour and fifteen minutes. I'm a paranoid person, so I started wondering what could happen if the meals showed up at my door simultaneously. Logically I knew the answer was “I would get two meals at the same time,” but in my mind the event turned into a fragrant fistfight, with two delivery men fighting for my loyalty, their noses punched in and my samosas getting smashed under their feet.

All of my worrying was for naught, though, Tiffin's food arrived forty minutes after I ordered, Ekta arrived in fifty. Both delivery times were drastically under what I was quoted, but my real surprise wasn't anything to do with the speedy arrival, or the even food (I'll get to that), but the price – the bills were exactly the same, $30.13. Ekta, my sweet Ekta, had raised its prices. Sure, I hadn't called in a while, but I thought we were in a committed relationship! I didn't think the restaurant would make such a drastic financial decision without consulting me.

Really though, I had always known somewhere deep in my heart that if Ekta didn't fail, a price raise was inevitable once they established their customer base. So, with the two meals of equal price, and Tiffin only slightly ahead in delivery, my boyfriend and I prepared to enjoy the identical meals. The differences weren't astounding. Ekta's dishes were a little spicier, while Tiffin's were sweeter and richer. Tiffin won the prize for best saag paneer (wonderfully creamy), rice (moister and more flavorful), and samosas (bright yellow on the inside, spiced with turmeric). Ekta, meanwhile, claimed a softer naan and more nuanced, spicier chicken tikka masala. Tiffin's tikka had a sweeter, more tomato-tasting sauce. There were other small differences; Ekta came with rice pudding for dessert while Tiffin arrived with a container of its ever-changing “accompaniment,” which on this occasion was chunks of paneer cheese in a creamy tomato sauce. Ekta had five chutneys and sauces, Tiffin had four and Ekta's sauces were better – especially their mint sauce. But even with those five sauces and chutneys, after a lot of thinking, I had to declare that for me, Tiffin made a more delicious dinner.

It might seem like I'm lashing out at my old beau Ekta's newly raised prices when I say that I'll be ordering from Tiffin from now on. But when it comes to Girard Avenue's Indian food, the old test-taking rule holds true: Trust your gut. The first love is usually the right one.

Meg Favreau is a writer and comedian living in Philadelphia. Check out her website, www.megfavreau.com.

Article photograph by Meg Favreau, via Flickr (Creative Commons), "Eat Drink Philly" photograph from suvodeb, via Flickr (Creative Commons), "Philly" photograph from camardella, via Flickr (Creative Commons).