conde nast top 50 for 2024

Clever global fare, wine & spirits served in a posh, bi-level space with floor-to-ceiling windows.

From chef Prateek Sadhu, formerly of Masque, NAAR is a small Himalayan-forward restaurant named for fire in Kashmiri. It approaches the Himalayas as both landscape and language: seasonal, regional, elemental, and shaped by altitude. The meal unfolds as a slow passage through salon, terrace, and dining room, with the mountain setting held close rather than treated as scenery. In its mood, NAAR is built for diners drawn to quiet ceremony, regional memory, and the sense that a restaurant can be rooted not only in cuisine, but in terrain.

Created by chef Kavan Kuttappa, Naru grew from lockdown-era ramen kits and a series of pop-ups into a small, reservation-only restaurant in central Bengaluru. Its 20-seat Shanti Nagar space is organised around counter dining, placing guests close to the cooks as handmade noodles, broths and precisely assembled bowls come together in view. Ramen remains the centre of a deliberately compact Japanese menu, supported by a handful of sides and drinks rather than the breadth of a conventional pan-Asian restaurant. Naru is ultimately a study in concentration: a focused menu, a closely timed meal and an intimate format built around the craft and immediate ritual of a single bowl.

Fashionable cafe and bar offering innovative Indian snacks and colonial inspired cocktails.

From chef-restaurateur Manu Chandra and hospitality entrepreneur Chetan Rampal, Lupa is a European and Mediterranean-influenced restaurant in Bengaluru, named after La Lupa, the she-wolf of Roman mythology. The restaurant’s design draws from Italian villa references, with terracotta, brass, marble, stone textures, fountains, and indoor-outdoor movement shaping the space.