Eating your way through Kathmandu
Newari food is a separate cuisine from anything else in Nepal, most visitors never try it, and the best of it is in courtyards you would walk past.
By Dawa Gurung · 6 min read · Updated 1 August 2026
Most visitors eat in Thamel, which is fine and is not Kathmandu food. The valley has its own cuisine, developed by the Newars over centuries, and it bears almost no resemblance to the trekking-lodge menu.
It is also the most social food in Nepal — built around sets of small dishes, festivals and drinking, rather than a plate of rice.
Here is what to look for and roughly where.
The Newari dishes to know
Samay baji, the set piece: beaten rice, choila, black soybeans, ginger, egg, greens and rice spirit, arranged on one plate. Eaten at festivals and increasingly in restaurants. Order this first if you order one thing.
Choila — buffalo, grilled over flame then tossed with mustard oil, chilli and spices. Smoky, hot, and the dish people remember.
Bara, a thick savoury lentil pancake, often with egg cracked onto it. Chatamari, a thin rice-flour crepe with toppings, unhelpfully marketed as Nepali pizza.
Yomari, a steamed dumpling shaped to a point with molasses and sesame inside, made particularly at Yomari Punhi in December.
Juju dhau from Bhaktapur — 'king curd', a thick sweet buffalo-milk yoghurt set in clay pots. Worth going to Bhaktapur for on its own.
Where to look
Not Thamel. It is convenient and it serves an international tourist menu well; it is not where the valley eats.
The old city south of Durbar Square, Patan's back lanes, and Bhaktapur. Newari eating houses are frequently up a stair or through a courtyard with no English sign, which is exactly why they are worth finding.
Ask your guide where they take their own family, not where they recommend for tourists. Those are two different lists and only one of them is useful.
The markets
Asan Tole in the old city is the vegetable, spice and grain market and has been for centuries — dense, loud, and one of the better hours in Kathmandu for anyone who likes food.
Go early. It is a working market that serves the city's households, and by late morning the best of it has gone.
Spices, dried chillies, lentils and tea are all worth buying and carrying home. Ask before photographing stalls; some traders mind and most do not.
Drinking
Newari food is built to be drunk with. Aila is the traditional distilled spirit, thon a fermented rice beer, and both are served in the older establishments.
Strength varies and home distillation is common, so pace it. This is not a category where consistency is guaranteed. Tongba — millet beer in a wooden pot, topped with hot water and drunk through a straw — is eastern Nepali rather than Newari but widely available and very good on a cold evening.
If you only have one evening
A Newari set meal in the old city or Patan, ordered as samay baji plus choila plus whatever the house does well, with aila if you want the full version.
Then walk. The old city after dark, with the shops shuttered and the courtyards lit, is a different place from the daytime one and considerably quieter.
Finish at a rooftop looking at Durbar Square. It is touristic and it is also lovely.
Walk it with us
Private departures on your dates, guided by the people who wrote this page.
Questions we get asked
Is Newari food vegetarian-friendly?
Partly — bara, chatamari, black soybeans and the vegetable dishes are excellent, but several of the celebrated dishes are buffalo. Say shakahari and you will be looked after.
Is street food safe?
Busy stalls with high turnover and food cooked in front of you are generally fine. Avoid anything sitting out, and treat water and ice as the real risk.
Can I do a food tour?
Yes, several run in Kathmandu and they are a good way into the old city's eating houses. Ask us and we will point you at one rather than assemble one ourselves.
What should I bring home?
Spices from Asan, Ilam tea, and Marpha apple brandy if you have been to Mustang. All cheap, all light, all better than a singing bowl.
Read next
Still deciding?
Tell us your dates and how much walking you have actually done, and we will tell you honestly whether this trek is the right one for you.
Ask a guide