First, we get in line for poha. Served with crunchy combination and finely chopped onions, it’s best eaten with freshly fried, deliciously sticky jalebis.
Then come the cocktails, paired with an intricate tasting menu and luxe setting at Indore’s Atelier V.
By midnight we head to town’s celebrated Sarafa market, jostling between hungry crowds, to do icy jamun pictures, eat sweet-savoury khopra potato pattice stuffed with coconut, and kulhad pizza. (Which is precisely what it feels like.) We pause consuming solely to admire the ‘Gold Man,’ who’s weighed down with glittering jewelry, and gape at Joshi’s well-known flying dahi bada. He spins every plate with spectacular dexterity, then provides salt, jeera and pink chilli powder with the flamboyance of a magician.
We are in Indore for one evening solely — however you may pack so much into 36 hours. As it seems, India’s cleanest metropolis can be riotous with flamboyant individuals and extravagant meals.
Small cities in India are usually topic to stereotypes, and Indore, identified for its heaving poha stalls, doesn’t seem to be a stage for a cutting-edge cocktail programme. Which is precisely what makes Atelier V so intriguing.
Vedant Newatia, founder and head chef, Atelier V
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Launched in 2024 by Vedant Newatia, who at 30 is the founder, head chef and chief cheerleader, the restaurant is buoyant with optimistic power due to its younger, idealistic staff. Flashing his many tattoos, collected as he travelled the world, Vendant explains why he selected to settle in Indore after coaching and internships at a number of the world’s most celebrated kitchens, together with Dominique Ansel’s bakery in New York and Baumeniere in France.
The interiors of Atelier V
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“This is my home town, I was born and brought up here. I did my schooling here. It’s a city of foodies, we love our pohas and jelebi. We love chatpata food,” he says. Then provides emphatically, “I don’t want Indore to be left behind big cities like Mumbai, Delhi and Bengaluru. I think this is Indore’s time to rise and shine.”
To show that they will sustain with the nation’s finest bars, Vedaant has simply launched a signature cocktails menu that explores 12 cities around the globe through flavour, approach, and storytelling. The drinks are gutsy and divisive, exhibiting that the staff is prepared to take dangers, and learn to get higher.
We do a tasting menu so we are able to strive the restaurant’s highlights: A smoky rooster lollypop smothered in Buffalo sauce, served with Sante, a France impressed mix of gin, ardour fruit and glowing wine. As Atelier V’s staff places it, this can be a “drink that wears silk to brunch.”
Sante!
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Proscht, impressed by Switzerland, is a mix of vodka, butterfly pea, and passionfruit. Then there’s Arriba from Mexico, with Tequila, jalapeño and precise salsa. Also strive the Indian illustration, Piyo, made with Gondhoraj, mango foam and caramelised banana. When Vedant serves Geonbae from Korea, a startling mix of black garlic, yuzu, and gin, he chuckles. “You are going to love it, or hate it.”
Let’s be sincere. I’m not a fan. I like my drinks clear and exact, with molecular gastronomy techniques like spherification, gelification and clarification recruited solely when strictly obligatory. Which is why my favorite drink on the menu can be probably their easiest, Down the hatch, impressed by the United Kingdom with gin, ginger, mint and cucumber. It’s deceptively easy, and you may drink a pair or extra earlier than realising how heady it’s.
Down The Hatch!
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Spunky bartender Karan Dhanelia, togged in a waistcoat and tattoos, is brutally sincere when he explains their strategy. “Basically straight drinks are very boring, it’s a very middle aged thing.” He grins. Then provides with a shrug, “I am young, and I like cocktails.”
Atelier V is at Satguru Parinay, AB Rd, Scheme No 54, Indore. Call 97551 25195 for reservations. It is open from 12.30 to 11 pm. Approximately 2500 for 2 individuals.
Published – September 02, 2025 04:09 pm IST
