The mediocrity of Raithane

This is a part of 'project 110, going back and re-filling', writing is happening 8ish months after the date.

Raithane, in the nice bougie part of Lalitpur, portends to present traditional Nepali foods and desserts in modern form, less of a fusion restaurant and more of a re-imagined cuisine. As somebody who likes eating food, is interested in culinary traditions and history, and loves engineering new food products, this was an exciting opportunity for me to understand what's the contemporary food scene in Kathmandu related to my interests. To put it differently, I wanted to like the place, I really really did!

Instead, the mediocrity of the foods, and the complete collapse of the service was a big disappointment. It needn't have been this way.

First the service: two of our ordered items couldn't be made, they told us 45 minutes after we'd taken our seats and ready to dig into the dishes. Then some item was burnt, they said, and it'd take them 30 minutes to recreate it. So on and on and on. It got tiring. The things they brought were...not specially inspired or creative, but derivative of existing brunch meals given a 'Nepali twist', if that phrase can be uttered without damaging one's eyeballs in the ensuing roll.

The dessert, which was supposed to be a khuwa cheesecake is what I was most excited about. I live for desserts -- and by the looks of it, might die by them, but that's a separate conversation -- adore cheesecake and am a big fan of khuwa. So the combo should have been the perfect dish for me. Not to be so, the dish hadn't been properly 'integrated', it would have been better as just khuwa, and a separate properly made cheesecake. The fusion was an abomination that just didn't work.

I really really really wanted to like this place, appreciate the cooks and the creator, and be proud about the work they've done. Unfortunately it's not in the cards as things are right now.