Naar means fire in Kashmiri. Much of the cooking at this restaurant is done over open flames.

Naar, chef Prateek Sadhu’s restaurant at Kasauli in Himachal Pradesh, ushers in destination dining in India with imagination, heart, and the soul of the Himalayas


Hail cab, reach restaurant, walk in, get table, order, eat, pay, leave. That’s how we dine out. Not when it’s at Naar. Dinner here entails making a booking weeks in advance, flying to Chandigarh, driving for two hours up the slopes of Kasauli (Himachal Pradesh) and, eventually, sitting down to a meal that becomes a cherished memory. It is memorable for the spectacular setting, the brilliant imagination behind the food and the joy all of it evokes.

Naar means fire in Kashmiri. Much of the cooking at this restaurant is done over open flames. But to the prodigiously talented chef, Prateek Sadhu, who dreamt up this restaurant, it’s a metaphorical rather than literal fire, signifying the burning desire to push boundaries, shatter templates and create something of beauty and meaning.

From salon to the dining room

Few restaurants in India can boast of such a spectacular setting. Naar, nestled amidst pine forests, occupies two square buildings built mostly of stone and wood in consonance with the terrain. They afford picturesque Himalayan views of impossibly blue skies and snow-capped mountains. The first space is a salon, inspired by the verandah attached to traditional Kashmiri homes where guests would be first received. For Naar was conceptualized and built to be home-like, consciously avoiding the filter of restaurants jaded by their cookie-cutter repetitiveness.

The salon is where Naar’s customers, some possibly frazzled by the drive along mountain roads, are first seated, to unwind and have a glass of sparkling wine or a cocktail such as the clear and absolutely drinkable Anthracite — vodka with an infusion of charred tomato, burnt butter, charcoal, red wine vinegar, mustard and Himalayan raw honey. A trio of appetizers arrive at a deliberately unhurried pace. Depending on the season, one of these may be Askali, the little puffs of batter from the Himachali snack repertoire. At Naar, this rustic snack is elevated with a filling of smoked cheese or duck. There could also be a tartlet topped with buckwheat, mango and cactus, sprinkled with sinki noon, a mountain salt.

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Travel fatigue dissolved and in the relaxed mood that luxury dining requires, guests move to the 16-seater dining room that flows into the kitchen. Guests can feel the warm embrace of the kitchen’s fires and take in its bustle as they settle in. Besides allowing for a shift of mood, this move from salon to dining room adds an extra layer to the dining experience and creates a sense of anticipation for what is to follow.

Flavours of home

The 11-course tasting menu I savoured had perfectly crafted dishes such as chicken livers on pine skewers, Sunderkala, a hand-pulled noodle from Uttarakhand, here served in an umami-rich broth of burnt vegetables and lamb, a tart-sweet Nimbu Saan, which had galgal, a type of mountain citrus, smashed with hemp seed salt, yogurt and jaggery, and a standout dish of the freshest, barely cooked trout on khambir, the Ladakhi bread. The cheese course had Himalayan cheeses served with Himachal’s famed apples and honey from the region.

The 11-course tasting menu had perfectly crafted dishes such as chicken livers on pine skewers and Sunderkala.

There was scarcely a false note in this symphony of a meal. But what Chef Prateek Sadhu is doing at Naar goes beyond serving food that’s comparable to that of the world’s best restaurants. From sourcing and celebrating Himalayan ingredients to drawing inspiration from the food and traditions of the region, his work is an ode to the mountains, to which he has felt a constant pull ever since he and his family were forced to leave their Baramulla home in the 1990s. And perhaps on account of that, for all its sophistication, dining at Naar reminds one of the comfort and sense of home that food cooked with care and served with warmth can provide.

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The chef who trained at the Culinary Institute of America and worked in a string of Michelin-starred restaurants in the US and also at Noma, before returning to India to work in hotels and, later, co-found Masque in Mumbai, says it was a giant leap of faith he took to open Naar in this remote location. Not even the most enterprising restaurateur had attempted this before in India.

Quite open to the possibility that his venture could fail, Prateek and his team were delightfully surprised when bookings started pouring in from day 1. Now, diners come from Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai and Bangalore, most making the trip specifically to dine at Naar. Destination dining, it would seem, has arrived on the Indian food scene.

Fuelling the fire

It is a culinary wave Europe, particularly Spain, witnessed with the success of El Bulli in the late 1990s, which then moved to the Nordic countries with Noma coming to the attention of the world. One of its original co-founders, Klaus Meyer, told me in an interview that at a time when good eating was becoming a movement in Scandinavia, Noma stood out as its highest and most visible form of expression.

It had a ripple effect, with several young chefs — some who had worked at Noma — stepping out and opening restaurants that emulated the principles the world’s No 1 restaurant — at the time — was built on. Copenhagen became a culinary mecca, with private jets carrying affluent gourmets flying in, proving that food can transform how people view and experience places.


That explosion of high energy in fine dining has now moved to South America, with restaurants in Peru, such as Central and Maido, serving Nikkei cuisine, making waves. Prateek Sadhu believes it’s India’s time now. Naar’s early success is proof that Indians are willing to travel great distances for great food. The market for destination restaurants with new and exciting concepts exists.

Unlike the Nordic countries, which had to invent a new cuisine from their scant resources and frugal eating habits, India’s abundance of indigenous ingredients and its rich culinary diversity might be all the inspiration that’s needed to fuel that wave. It’s time then for chefs and restaurateurs to create new concepts, find their inner naar and be trail-blazers.

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