India’s Best Restaurant Is 16 Seats in the Hills Near Kasauli
NAAR took No. 1 at the Condé Nast Traveller × District awards. The tasting menu is ₹7,500, about $78.
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NAAR, 16 seats on a cliff near Darwa, is No. 1 on the Condé Nast Traveller × District Top Restaurant Awards for 2026. The list came out on October 5, after a ceremony in Goa. The room is in Himachal Pradesh’s Solan district, about 45 minutes from Kasauli and two and a half hours by road from Chandigarh.
NAAR is the Kashmiri word for fire. Prateek Sadhu left the Kashmir Valley as a five-year-old in 1990, co-founded Masque in Mumbai, and later left that kitchen. On November 24, 2023 he opened this one inside Amaya, a hillside hotel in the pines. Kamlesh Negi cooks with him. The hearth burns juniper. Six menus follow the mountain year, served in a cluster of wood and slate huts. Sadhu has called the opening a jump without a parachute.
The Table in Colaba was second. Papa’s, Hussain Shahzad’s 12-seat room above a Bandra sandwich shop, was third. FarmLore, outside Bengaluru, and Sienna Calcutta followed. Mumbai and Goa each placed 13 restaurants in the 50, the first time Goa has matched Mumbai. A jury of 105 voted in two rounds, with Deloitte advising on the count.
Chandigarh is the airport that makes the trip reasonable, then the hill road through Dharampur. The last stretch winds, so don’t cut the arrival close. The meal runs about as long as the drive: a drink in the salon, then about 200 metres up a slope to the dining hut. Ask ahead if you need a buggy. Lunch is 12:30 to 4 and dinner starts at 6:30, Tuesday through Sunday. Mondays are closed. A table is confirmed only after you pay in full. Call +91 88004 22053 between noon and 8, or email reservations@restaurantnaar.com.
The tasting menu is ₹7,500 a person before tax and a voluntary service charge, about $78. One menu is vegetarian and one includes meat. Pairings, also before tax, are ₹5,000 for cocktails, ₹3,500 without alcohol, and ₹6,500 for wine. Say so at least 48 hours before you pay if you have an allergy. The kitchen will not rebuild the menu at the table.
Dishes that have come through the kitchen include cured fish, lamb smoked over juniper with mushq budij, a short-grain rice from Kashmir, buckwheat pasta from Ladakh, and pine ice cream when that course is up. Negi forages as much as he cooks, and the farm is on the walk to the table. If the drive needs a stop, Ishar Sweets on the Kalka–Shimla road does kulfi and kalakand.
Sleep at Amaya if a room is open. Otherwise stay in Kasauli and settle the car both ways before you sit down. Masque, the Mumbai restaurant Sadhu left, is in the middle of a rebuild under founder Aditi Dugar and head chef Varun Totlani: India’s Best Restaurant Is Closing So It Can Get Michelin-Ready.