Karigari: Where Craft, Cuisine Collective memory Converge

Some restaurants serve meals. Karigari, in Connaught Place-Janpath, serves memories.

- NAMRATA KOHLI

Every detail — from the walls to the spoons to the stories — seems to whisper one thing: India tastes best when it is crafted, not constructed. A rare restaurant where the heart meets the craft. And where India tastes like India. The best part is that Karigariis nottrying to be fusion or chase trends. It's familiar. It revives traditions.

"Karigari is a tribute to the hands behind every creation — the artisans, the cooks, the designers," says Yogesh Sharma, Managing Director, Karigari Ventures. For Sharma, the name is not branding; it is a worldview. Karigari belongs to the quiet creators who turn imagination into reality. "For us, their unseen skill is the soul of every experience."

But what really stands out is the restaurant's restraint. In a world where "reinvention" often means distortion, Karigari refuses to tamper with classics. The original dal makhani is exactly that — original. Slow-cooked, velvety, deeply flavoured. Their Wadiyan ka Parantha (with black masoor dal) is a beautiful ode to home kitchens, not hotel kitchens. There is the Bel ka sherbet - a cultural revival in the age of Pepsi and Limca.