LA’s South Asian Dining Scene in 2026: What to Try and What to Skip

The Kerala plate Jonathan Gold loved is still in Culver City. The new energy is momos and Bangladeshi mustard oil. Hollywood Boulevard is a detour.

Updated September 25, 2026United States · California · Los Angeles

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Palm trees and a winding road at sunset, with the downtown Los Angeles skyline in the distance — Photo: Venti Views · Unsplash License

The appam at Mayura arrives pale and lacy, a fermented rice-and-coconut pancake with a soft well in the middle. The Kerala fish curry next to it is coconut-sour, meant to be torn and scooped, not pushed around with a fork. Jonathan Gold kept this Culver City strip-mall room on his 101 Best Restaurants list for years because that plate was hard to find anywhere else in Los Angeles. You still have to drive to Culver City for it.

The rest of the city’s South Asian cooking is just as scattered. Pioneer Boulevard in Artesia is still the densest Indian corridor. Nepali kitchens sit in Palms and Old Town Pasadena. The Bangladeshi room people keep writing about this year is on Western Avenue, outside Little Bangladesh. Hollywood Boulevard will feed you if you already walked the stars. It will not tell you much about how the city actually eats.

Culver City, Pioneer, the Westside

If you came for Kerala, stay on Venice Boulevard and order from the Mayura Specials: appam, porotta, or idiyappam with fish curry. Wander the full North Indian page and you will get a competent mixed meal that is not why Gold kept coming back.

Pioneer Boulevard rewards a name. Jay Bharat is the Gujarati vegetarian room that started in a garage in the 1980s: thali, farsan, a sweets counter. Anjappar is the Chennai-born Chettinad outpost, the one for goat, black pepper, and heat. Show up without a destination and the street will sell you a buffet that could live in any suburb.

On the Westside, Fitoor is the reservation night. It opened on Ocean Avenue in Santa Monica in late 2024, with lead chef Surya Kumar and executive chef Vaibhav Sawant cooking Hyderabadi dum biryani, Guntur fried chicken, and a purple-potato ragda built like chaat. In February, Matthew Kang at Eater LA called it the most composed modern Indian food in the city. If you are already west and want Pakistani karahi instead of a cocktail room, Khan Saab is chef Imran Ali Mookhi’s Bib Gourmand kitchen, now on Santa Monica Boulevard.

Momos in Palms, mustard oil on Western

Tara Gurung Black opened Tara’s Himalayan Cuisine on Venice Boulevard in 2007. The room still cooks the Nepali-Tibetan food she grew up with: steamed momos with tomato achaar, yak chili when the meat is in, a Sherpa stew that tastes like a house pot. A few blocks over, Momo Souls is a family counter that spent a year at markets before taking a Palms storefront. Order chicken momos and pick a sauce. Jhol is the thin, sesame-tangy one. Butter masala is the crowd bowl. The paper trays overflow, so bring people.

East of downtown, Tibet Nepal House has held a quiet corner of Old Town Pasadena since 2001. Proprietor Raj Adhikari’s sit-down is still the easy Himalayan lunch: momos, thukpa, a buffet if you want to taste around, yak at dinner when the shipment lands.

Search “Indian” and you will miss the Bangladeshi rooms. Roshona Bilash is chef-owner Abul Ibrahim’s family restaurant at 861 North Western Avenue in Melrose Hill. The lamb shank comes in a mustard-oil gravy that cuts the gaminess. The nihari is soupy with bone marrow. There is Bengali-style biryani, beef teheri, and fuchka, the puffed chaat with tamarind water. Ibrahim walks the room with chai. The kitchen sits outside Little Bangladesh. Eater and The Infatuation have been sending people here all year.

On Vermont Avenue, Aladin Sweets and Market has been the neighborhood mithai-and-cafeteria stop since 1993, when Farida and Serajul opened after leaving Jashore. Go for roshogolla, tehari, mutton, and the sweet case. On West Third, Biriyani Kabob House is the Little Bangladesh destination: Enam Karim’s football-size Hyderabadi lamb shank over rice. His kitchen pulls from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and North India. The strip is mixed. That one plate is the reason to park.

Hollywood Boulevard and Abbot Kinney

Bollywood Grill and Urban Masala sit on the Walk of Fame and will hand you tikka masala, naan, and a table if you already walked the stars. Eat there if you are already on the boulevard.

Abbot Kinney is selling a night out. Badmaash, the Mahendro family’s Indian gastropub, opened a Venice room there in March. Downtown and Fairfax still cook the tighter versions of the tikka poutine and chili-cheese naan that made the brand. In July, The Infatuation called the beach food decent, the $93 steak frites skippable, and the room a place to drink before you keep walking. Keep it as a bar stop. Dinner is still in Culver City or Palms.

Pick one kitchen and confirm the hours before you leave. The longer list is on our Los Angeles dining guide.