Some meals begin long before the first course. By the time I arrived at Naar in Kasauli, where Quintonil had taken residence for a few days, the journey had already begun to feel symbolic. A flight to Chandigarh, then a three-hour, long-weekend crawl up winding hill roads. Still, far shorter than the 15,000 kilometres to Mexico City.
I had done my research. The third-best restaurant in the world landing in the hills of Himachal was no small feat. If there was one place it could feel at home in India, it was Naar. Before dinner, we gathered under the night sky around a fire, champagne in hand, as chef Prateek Sadhu and his co-founder Akshay told us how Naar was founded. Coming from a very polluted Delhi, all I could do was breathe in the fresh pine and stare up at the stars in wonder.
For those who track the upper echelons of global dining, Quintonil needs little introduction. A mainstay on The World’s 50 Best Restaurants — currently ranked third — it has come to represent the assured confidence of modern Mexican cuisine. At its helm is chef Jorge Vallejo, whose cooking is rooted not in spectacle but in hyperlocal ingredients. His menus draw from Mexico’s biodiversity, from native herbs, heirloom corn to coastal seafood.
What made Kasauli compelling, however, was not just Vallejo’s arrival with his two-Michelin-star team, but the parallel philosophy waiting for him at Naar. Chef Prateek, too, builds his food around Himalayan produce. The intrigue wasn’t simply to taste Quintonil in India, but to witness two ingredient-first chefs from vastly different landscapes discover their shared dialect.
Dinner began outside. The cold biting at our fingers until a warm broth was placed in our hands. Made with root vegetables from the farm and sharpened with jalapeño, it delivered an almost meaty depth of umami that felt improbable for something entirely vegetarian.
The first course by Quintonil’s team was the tostada — delicate, architectural, almost too pretty to eat. Mole, briny mussels, and beautiful coriander flowers. The first bite was chaos in the best way: crunch giving way to silk, ocean salinity meeting dark, complex chilli.
And then, there were the insects. The insects were impossible to ignore. Grasshoppers glazed over Himalayan trout. Cocopache, a tree-dwelling bug, was handed around as a snack between courses. It was thrilling, and kept the room abuzz (pun intended) as it got passed around, everyone watching for the other’s reaction as we popped these crunchy bugs in our mouths.
The crescendo was unmistakable: Quintonil’s signature dessert. Crème fraîche and melipona bee honey ice cream crowned with caviar, set over a layer of Himalayan persimmon. It was sweet, it was salty, and it was perfect. My favourite of the night, that was the dish I’m still thinking about.
Throughout the meal, colour commanded the table, vivid greens, burnished reds, inky sauces, as if these two countries were being represented on the plate.
If the food carried geography on the plate, the bar told the full story.
Naar’s home bar sits almost quietly in the background. Just bottles without labels, vinegars made in-house, honeys sourced and infused, ferments quietly working away. The bartender, born and raised in the hills, moves through it with the ease of someone who grew up around these ingredients. The ingredients weren’t trends to him; they’re things he’s seen his mother and grandmother use to pickle and dry for years. Even the waste finds a second life — crop scraps, kitchen trimmings, bar by-products all turned into ferments and tinctures.
Don Julio had put together a cocktail menu that was impossible to choose from, each one sounding more interesting than the other. The Hemp and Honey cocktail was the first. Toasted hemp and coriander seeds dusted along the rim, the aroma hitting before the sip. It tasted rooted, nutty, herbaceous and delicious. And then there was the Don Paloma, built on Don Julio tequila but with a Himalayan twist: fermented strawberry, rosemary, dried tomato peels.
That was when the metaphor became obvious. Mexican agave meeting Himalayan fermentation. A spirit born in Jalisco holding its own among mountain herbs and house-made vinegars. It didn’t feel forced. It felt collaborative.
A Night to Remember
By the end of the night, the room had loosened. Glasses had been refilled more than once, plates wiped clean, conversations flowing easier. There was a collective fullness, not just from the food, but from the sense that we had witnessed something unlikely. Before we dispersed, everyone stood with a shot of Don Julio in hand as chef Prateek Sadhu raised a toast to Jorge Vallejo and his team from Quintonil.
It felt rare in the way that certain dinners do, not because of rankings or prestige, but because you’re aware, in real time, that you are witnessing something exceptional. The third-best restaurant in the world, in a small corner of the Himalayas.
