37 Best Restaurants in Mumbai, India

The food at Shree Thaker Bhojnalaya (not to be confused with Thackers, another Gujarati restaurant) makes an excellent primer for those venturing into vegetarian Gujarati thalis (a limitless set meal served on a metal plate called a thali). The restaurant is tiny, cheap, rather nondescript, and hidden away amidst the warren of Kalbadevi's lanes, but the extra peregrinating is well worth it—this is as close to homey Gujarati food as you will get in this city.

If you're searching for an authentic seafood "lunch home"—which implies unpretentious, tasty, and cheap—this old-school Kala Ghoda mainstay is spot on: slightly dingy, full of locals, with a too-cold a/c section that smells faintly of mothballs. Whichever main dish you choose, order an accompaniment of neer dosa—they are a little like rotis, but much lighter and fluffier, and made of rice; most Konkan restaurants have them, but none do them better than Apoorva.

Indian food is often perceived to be a monolith of spicy curries and tandoori chicken, but for those looking to shatter these snap judgments, Bombay Canteen is the place to go. In a brilliant effort to champion the sort of ingredients that rarely make it into restaurant dishes, executive chef Hussain Shahzad and its late culinary director Floyd Cardoz (once chef of New York restaurant Bombay Bread Bar) have wended their way around the country, subsuming ingredients like rat tail radish and colocasia roots into a playful menu with a global edge.

Chef Niyati Rao builds Ekaa's menu around India's seasonal bounty, with each dish named after its primary ingredient like "Corn" or "Fried Chicken." The results are dishes that creatively expand on the primary ingredient with added flavors and textures, like fried chicken with soy pickle, egg yolk jam, and fermented cauliflower. Cocktails at Ekaa toe a similar line, thanks to the bar manager who comes up with delicious drinks like Petrichor, a monsoon-inspired melange of mezcal, coconut vermouth, gooseberry, and calcium stone.

Among the most beloved lunch spots for South Mumbai's workaday crowd, this quaint little café is the ideal spot to grab a soy latte and a quick bite while resting your feet. The fresh juices and salads are cheap but clean and safe for foreigners, the Wi-Fi is free, and the interior, while a bit cramped, is bright and pleasant---and best of all, the sandwiches, like the KGC Special (arugula, vegetarian mayo, and Padano cheese on grilled flat bread), are light but extremely tasty when snuggled up to a hot (or more preferably iced) cup of joe. It's in a popular neighborhood, just a stone's throw from Jehangir Art Gallery and Knesset Eliyahoo Synagogue.

Step in for a moment of quietude at this stylish coffee shop (named for its location in the century-old building, Kitab Mahal) that doubles as a co-working space. Don’t miss the community nights here---they include anything from wine tastings to movie screenings.

Veering off from Colaba's arterial thoroughfare, Colaba Causeway, is Ling's Pavilion, a venerable Cantonese-style restaurant and Mumbai icon run by Baba Ling and Nini Ling, its third-generation owners. The décor is a sort of gracious 1970s time warp---pagoda-style roof and a likeness of a Chinese terra-cotta warrior at the entrance.

Hands down the best upscale North Indian food in town for meat eaters, this restaurant in a beautifully designed building at the track makes the journey to the city center utterly worthwhile. Portions are big—as are the prices—and the food is heavy but sophisticated.

Serving a whimsical, excellently executed menu of dishes inspired by the Catholic-dominated state of Goa, O'Pedro simultaneously pays homage to its Portuguese antecedents. Go at dinnertime to avoid the clatter of the patrons who descend upon the restaurant for their lunch break from the nearby offices and to enjoy seeing the wood-fired oven lit up.

Chef Alex Sanchez’s Latin American restaurant Otra, a hat-tip to his Puerto Rican roots, is chic, very loud, and always packed to the rafters. And with good reason: the staff make their own masa (corn dough), which finds its way into a rainbow of dishes like chochoyotes, tacos, and tostadas.

This Bandra West restaurant offers an intriguing tryst with regional pan-Indian flavors, the kind that rarely feature on restaurant menus in the city. Nurse a drink at the bar downstairs and then make your way upstairs to the romantic mezzanine floor; it sits chockablock with vintage photographs, wooden furniture, and candelabras on each table.

Launched by a pair of Indian restaurateurs and a young American chef from San Francisco, The Table offers American fare inflected with flavors from around the world. The lofted upper floor is perfect for romantic dinners; below is a more lively and sociable setting, with a large, eponymous, communal table extending from the bar. The delicious breads are made at The Table's sister space in central Mumbai, Mag Street Kitchen, and it also uses ingredients from its own organic farm.

Ideal for long, lazy, tea-inspired meals, the Teahouse has a boggling variety of teas for the connoisseur. Go for the languorous lunches and stay for the charming, old-fashioned décor. Coffee drinkers aren't ignored either, and have the arduous task of choosing between a South Indian-style filter coffee or a French press coffee. A few doors down, Sancha Tea Boutique sells pretty tea-related things that make excellent gifts.

The only real bar in town (in the American sense, at least) is modeled on an English pub, plays decent music (though sometimes too loud), has great snack food, and free Wi-Fi (that can sometimes be spotty), and some of the best-priced alcohol in town. Try the tenderloin burgers, the pizzas—the four cheese is excellent, and the margarita’s no slouch—or an old-fashioned plate of beer-battered fish-and-chips.

Araku's food is fashionably cuisine-agnostic and made from organic and regenerative local farms, but we'd recommend stopping by for its excellent coffee. Its sleek coffee bar sits at the head of the restaurant and offers everything from cortado and espresso, to cool, fizzy caffeine brews served with lots of ice.

Bandra's beautiful people—Bollywood stars, expats, creative types—flock to this hip, casual café on tony Pali Hill. The laid-back style, plentiful outdoor seating, and excellent quality food more than make up for the fact that the bagels are just round bread, not the standard boiled-then-baked variety. Order a whole-wheat bagel with Goan-style chicken sausage and cream cheese, and one of the wonderful seasonal fruit smoothies, as you lounge on one of the rattan couches.

Folding in an ensemble cast of underrated Indian dishes like Manipuri black rice and kharonda fruit into its menu, Bawri prides itself on wood and charcoal cooking that fumes the food with dark, sweet, earthen flavors. Among their most popular dishes are the stuffed gucchi mushrooms, the smoked mutton chops, and the jackfruit biryani.

A trip to India can represent an opportunity for travelers to test the ropes at living vegetarian for a while (veg options constitute literally half of every menu here), but few major restaurants in the city have mastered all the possibilities of vegetarian like the charming Burma Burma. Ankit Gupta, the owner, is half Burmese, and demands authenticity, so short of a separate flight to Myanmar itself, you're not likely to find dishes as skillful as these in many other places; the restaurant also serves excellent teas (but no alcohol).

Dingy—but not dirty—Churchill specializes in British-style comfort food (e.g., starchy and simple roast beef and gravy with steamed veggies and mashed potatoes), and its red-and-white vinyl interior fits the food. The desserts are some of the best Mumbai has to offer—at any given time you'll find five kinds of chocolate cake (brownie, truffle, you name it), and five kinds of cheesecake in the dessert case.

One of the city's most popular dining and drinking spots, the roomy, open, yet strangely utilitarian Café Zoe serves European and continental breakfasts, brunches, lunches, dinners, and drinks. Depending on what time you arrive at this converted industrial compound, the crowd may include young parents feeding their one-year-old daughter sweet bites of Belgian waffles, local journalists shoveling down hot minestrone soup while using the free Wi-Fi, dating couples sharing a romantic dinner of seafood and pasta, or young partygoers drinking cocktails in a dim but sensuous atmosphere after midnight.

Once the exclusive domain of a members-only club, Kathiwada City House has opened a tiny corner of its space to the gawking public. Circle Sixty Nine, a small eatery by restaurateur Aditi Dugar (who also opened Masque), serves European-inspired fare to a view of the tiny terraced courtyard.

This very popular vegetarian restaurant, begun in 1958 and now part of a chain, is a convenient address in the city for delicious chana bhatura: the piping-hot, football-size puris made from white flour and yeast are served with spicy chickpeas and raw onions and lemons. The cheesy nachos and deep-fried corn cheese balls are good snack options, especially when washed down with their popular ice cream soda. It's so popular on weekends that the staff have initiated curbside pickup for the hungry hordes left waiting on the road for a seat in the restaurant.

Suburbanites love this seafood joint near Juhu Beach, which compares favorably with the coastal restaurants in Fort. The Phoenix Mall branch is sleek and modern, while the original Vile Parle location is a bit tacky and dated but better regarded (as most originals are).

There are other branches across Mumbai, but they are all in the northern suburbs.

Set in the middle of the city’s racecourse, Gallops has a classic, consistent, North Indian and 1970s-style "continental" European menu. To book the alfresco section---a rarity in Mumbai---you'll have to call in advance; it's usually kept closed, and opened for special parties or receptions.

A genteel throwback to the continental dishes of the 1950s, '60s, and '70s, Gaylord opened in the 1950s and has consistently fed the city's sense of nostalgia by eschewing faddish culinary crazes and sticking to old-fashioned Indian and European dishes like lobster thermidore; it also has a bakery that sells bread, pastries, and other dainties. There is an opulent air-conditioned section, but you want to sit outside on its pretty patio, fringed with a white-latticed boundary.

A Mumbai outpost of the Michelin-starred London original, this Bandra haunt is worth a visit for those who absolutely must have a fancy Chinese dinner. Even then, it's likely only worth dining here if you're in Bandra already.

When it defiantly reopened just four days after the first shots of the 2008 terrorist attacks were fired and 10 people were killed, the crowds were so big the police had to shut the place down all over again (the ownership has preserved bullet holes from the attack on its upstairs windows for people to see). Order a bottle of ice-cold Kingfisher beer to wash down the hearty, typical bar food—chicken tikka, french fries, that kind of thing, or go with the Chinese food that is actually the better bet.

You’ll have to navigate Bandra’s warren of lanes on foot to reach The Lovefools---the perfect way to prime your appetite for Chef Sarita Pereira’s experimental cooking (her influences swing from Scandinavian to Japanese to Indian). The bonus is that you can sit in air-conditioned comfort in an old-fashioned heritage bungalow in Bandra or eat alfresco in its charming little courtyard, a rare pleasure in Mumbai.

Located at ITC's Rama International, this restaurant has plenty of North Indian as well as local Maharashtrian dishes on offer. Get the chef to make you the local special, the meaty naan khaliya, a throwback to the Mughal era. The decor is elegant but unremarkable.

At this airy cafe full of sunlight, you can find comforting breads and French baked goods, as well as an assortment of savory breakfast items. There are branches in Lower Parel and Bandra.