Why ker and sangri belong on a tasting menu
Two desert ingredients, dried for months, that taste of where they grow.
What a ₹4,800 tasting menu pays for
Ingredients, a long day of prep, 28 seats and two sittings: a plain look at where the money goes.
Our nine-course tasting menu costs ₹4,800 per guest before taxes. It is a significant amount for a dinner, and we would like guests to know what it pays for. Here is a rough breakdown for an average evening.
Ingredients account for about ₹1,350 per guest. That includes goat from a farm near Ajmer, cheese from a dairy in Pushkar, millets from Sikar, ghee from a single herd, seasonal vegetables and fruit, and the dried desert pantry of ker, sangri and kachri, which costs more each year as the wild harvest shrinks. Every source is named on the back of the menu.
Labour is the largest share, roughly ₹1,900 per guest. A kitchen team of nine and a dining room team of seven look after 56 guests a night across two sittings. Prep for a single evening starts at 9 am: the smoking, the stocks, hand-patted rotis, pickles and sherbets are all made that day. Those hours are spread over relatively few seats.
The kothi itself takes another ₹700 or so per guest, covering rent, electricity, gas, linen, repairs to a 1930s building and breakage of glass and ceramics, which is higher than most people imagine. Card fees, insurance and the small things like candles and flowers add about ₹250. What remains is around ₹600 per guest, about 12%, which is the restaurant’s margin before tax. It pays for slow weeks, new equipment and the six weeks of testing each new menu needs. We keep seats few and sittings unhurried by choice, and the price reflects that choice.
