---
type: Place
title: Kathmandu
description: Nepal's capital and Harry's base for the 2023 series — Newari kitchens up hillside lanes, charcoal sekuwa, the Tibetan quarter of Boudha, and dal bhat in Thamel.
tags: [kathmandu, nepal, street-food, newari, boudha, thamel, buddhism]
coordinates: {lat: 27.7083, lng: 85.3206}
timestamp: 2026-08-04T12:00:00Z
---

# Kathmandu

The capital of [Nepal](/countries/nepal.md) and the base for Harry's 2023
series. What he takes from it first is range: a Newari restaurant built into a
hillside, a barbecue yard run off a wood oven, a Tibetan Buddhist quarter, and
a Thakali kitchen in the nightlife district, all inside one day and all
completely unlike each other.

Practical texture from the same day: no metro, traffic negotiated by weaving
through it, and lanes narrow enough that the best restaurants are effectively
unfindable without someone who knows them.

## What Harry did

Ate four full meals across the city on a $50 budget with [Raj](/people/raj.md),
a local guide running his own tour company, who drove and chose most of the
stops.

On another day he walked the city with [Yisha](/people/yisha.md), who took him
to Pashupatinath and to dinner at Dwarika's.

## Newari food

The city's own tradition, and the meal he starts with — served on a hillside
above rice fields, sitting on the floor.

- **The platter**: buffalo, beaten rice, marinated potato, egg, vegetables and
  a thick warm bread. Harry compares the spread to a thali and describes the
  beaten rice as looking and tasting something like porridge.
- **Bara** — a thick lentil pancake topped with egg, no meat at all, which the
  cooks call Nepali pizza. Lentil, salt, ginger and garlic paste, and the
  guide's own favourite dish.
- **Chatamari** — the thin, crisp flatbread version, with meat mixed through.
- **Bone marrow**, served inside the buffalo bone: crunchy outside, almost pure
  fat inside.
- **Yomari** — the dessert, shaped by hand like a momo and filled with hot
  syrup, which goes everywhere.

## Sekuwa barbecue

Charcoal-grilled meat, and the reason to go is the oven: wood-fired, with trays
of buffalo, chicken, pork and mutton lowered in for about twenty minutes while
the fat drips through. Harry calls it the hottest thing he has ever stood next
to and doesn't understand how the cook survives the shift.

Pork is the pick — caramelised, fatty and not spicy. Also served: pakora,
sadeko-style salads mixed at a condiment bench, a puffed-rice salad, and goat
head with the eye still in it. The goat head is health food rather than a
delicacy: high protein, given to the ill and to pregnant women, and normally
made into soup.

Prices are ordinary. This is where people come with friends and a beer.

## Boudha

The Buddhist and heavily Tibetan quarter, built around a stupa Harry dates to
the fifth century and considerably larger than the monkey temple elsewhere in
the city. You walk it clockwise, touching the prayer wheels. Entry is free for
Nepalis and 500 rupees for foreigners.

The Tibetan community here are largely refugees the Nepalese government
permitted to settle. The prayer flags are prayers written on cloth, with the
colours standing for the elements — the wind is what carries them.

Around the stupa: monks, tourist shops, and a lot of copied climbing gear.

### The Laughing Center

A noodle shop in Boudha, and worth it for the machine as much as the food —
dough is fed in, flattened, cut and trimmed in one pass, then sold on to
restaurants across the area.

The laughing noodles are served cold, dressed with chilli, soy, garlic and
vinegar, and made gluten-free, with the extracted gluten served alongside as a
separate item. Order the spice knowing it arrives several seconds after the
mouthful does.

## Pashupatinath

The most sacred Hindu site in Nepal, a UNESCO world heritage site, and — with
Varanasi — one of the two that matter most. Non-Hindus cannot enter the main
temple; foreigners pay 1,000 rupees to enter the complex and watch from the far
bank, where you can see into the courtyard and just make out the bull.

Cremations happen in the open along the riverbank, continuously and in public
view, with families and onlookers around them. The ashes go into the river,
which runs on eventually toward the Ganges. Yisha, who took Harry there, said
she expects to be cremated on the same ghats.

Also in the complex: sadhus sitting and smoking charas on the far side, who
will talk to you and offer it; troops of monkeys, so zip your pockets; and
several hundred stray dogs, sixty of whom are fed daily by a man who has been
doing it for 25 years and calls them his kids.

Wash your hands and take your shoes off at the gate. There is, incongruously, a
funfair immediately outside.

## Dwarika's and the Krishnarpan menu

The heritage-hotel dining room, and the most expensive meal in the bundle: six
courses of Nepali food for about $113 (from video – unverified), eaten
cross-legged on the floor. Prince Harry has eaten there, which the staff
volunteer.

The menu's conceit is geography — each course comes from a different part of
the country:

- **Newari** to start: beaten and puffed rice, black-eyed peas, soya and kidney
  beans, sun-dried baby prawns, lentil pancakes, chicken, potato and a small
  fried fish.
- **The Terai plains**, near the Indian border: puri, chickpeas, keema,
  mushrooms and peas.
- **The mountains**, represented by momos — buffalo, chicken and fish, colour
  coded.
- **Nine-bean soup**, a Himalayan dish, now usually made with vegetables added.
- **Dal bhat** as the main, with black and brown rice, aubergine, potato and
  spiced chicken.
- **Dessert**: sweet potato with yoghurt and honey, fruit and jelly balls, then
  black coffee.

Two things worth knowing. Vegetables come from the restaurant's own farm. And
the ritual at the start: a portion of the first course is offered to the gods
and ancestors — only the first, because once you have begun eating, the food is
impure and can no longer be offered.

Allow about an hour and a half.

## Thamel and dal bhat

Thamel is the nightlife quarter, and the Thakali kitchens there serve the
national plate: rice, dal, vegetables, a meat, spinach, pickles, a crisp
cracker and yoghurt for dessert, all on one tray. Ten separate things, each
tasting different, eaten with the hands and refilled.

It is what most Nepalis eat every day, because it's cheap and quick to make.

## Harry's tips

- Take a guide who drives. The Newari place is up a steep hill and down lanes
  he says he'd never have found, and the same is true of most of the day — see
  [travel with a local guide](/tips/travel-with-a-local-guide.md).
- Order across traditions rather than across a menu. Newari, Tibetan and
  Thakali food in one day tells you more about the country than any single
  restaurant will.
- Take the raksi when it's offered, and drink it with the food.
- Ask what the offal is for before deciding against it. The goat head has a
  medical logic behind it.
- Negotiate the taxi. 700 was the opening price for a ride Harry paid 400 for,
  with the ride app as the reference — see
  [haggle with a reference price](/tips/haggle-with-a-reference-price.md).
- Go to Pashupatinath even if it isn't on your list. Harry wasn't going to and
  says afterwards he's glad he was talked into it.
- Put the camera down at the ghats. Cremations happen in the open and the
  families are right there — see
  [don't point the camera at private moments](/tips/dont-film-private-moments.md).

## Source

- [Nepal Ultimate $50 Food Challenge🇳🇵](/videos/19pqOso9RG0.md) —
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19pqOso9RG0
- [Nepalese Girl Shows Me Kathmandu🇳🇵](/videos/CtB_10bPImM.md) —
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtB_10bPImM