Glenary's

The Room

Glenary's has been a café and restaurant on Darjeeling's Nehru Road since 1885. The building is the one every Darjeeling visitor photographs — a tall white-fronted Raj-era structure overlooking the Chowrasta pedestrian plaza, with a bakery on the ground floor and a proper dining room upstairs. The restaurant has changed hands and refurbished across 140 years but has never closed, and never completely lost its original atmosphere.

The menu is continental with Indian inflections — roast chicken, grilled trout, sizzling steaks, a section of tandoor dishes, a long pasta menu, and the locally-famous Glenary's pastries and chicken patties that the bakery downstairs has been producing since the nineteenth century. Execution is reliably good rather than extraordinary; the draw is the room, the history, and the location.

The bar menu runs a respectable cocktail list built around Indian craft gins and imported Scotch. The wine list is short but functional. Live music on weekend evenings — usually acoustic, jazz, or light pop — adds to the atmosphere without overwhelming conversation.

Dinner runs ₹1,800 to ₹3,000 per head. The restaurant takes reservations via phone and in person but walk-ins are usually accommodated mid-week. The first-floor dining room with Mall-facing windows is the table to request.