- Baker’s Café for sandwiches, baked items, hot beverages with a view of the mountains
- Osm Restro & Lounge for a hint of fine dining with great food and a view of MG Marg
- Taste of Tibet for Tibetan delicacies like momos, thukpa, and shyaphale etc.
- The Coffee Shop for great food with great ambience
- Shuffle Momos for momos, momos, and some more momos
- Café Live & Loud for live music, hookah, and local beer
So, you are in Gangtok and looking for restaurants to have good food after a hectic day of sightseeing. Or maybe like we did, you are not in Gangtok yet, but you are already making a list of researching (don’t let anyone tell you otherwise) places where you can find those mouth-watering momos, quaint little cafés with a view, cheap eateries for indulging in the name of “trying out new stuff”, or places to have a romantic dinner.
I’ll admit that while planning for our trip, we spent more time on researching best restaurants in Gangtok and Darjeeling, than on best hotels to stay in. And here is the list of places to eat in Gangtok that we came up with. It has special mentions of what they are famous for and what you can expect from them.
1. Baker’s Cafe
This is the one place in Gangtok we kept going back to. Baker’s Café is a quaint little place right on MG Marg with a huge collection of baked goodies, hot and cold beverages, assortments of usual burgers and sandwiches, and Italian delicacies like pasta and pizza. And all that within a very reasonable price range, bordering on cheap. The ambience of the place and ever smiling service staff make you feel welcome. On a clear day you can see Kanchenjunga if you get a table by the windows. We were not so lucky as it was quite rainy and overcast during our entire stay at Gangtok. You can check out their menu at Zomato, but they have a huge collection of freshly made cookies, muffins, pastries, donuts, and cakes that are available on the display counter but not in the menu. If you love cafés and are looking for budget restaurants in Gangtok, look no further.
Reason to visit: Baked items, Sandwiches, Pizzas, Hot beverages with a view of the mountains
Location: MG Marg, Gangtok (Google Maps)
2. Shuffle Momos
If you are in Gangtok, there is a good chance that you’ll be looking for momos at some point. And if that is the case, try Shuffle Momos. Period. Not only do they have a nice collection of non-vegetarian as well as vegetarian momos, but they also offer free home delivery all over Gangtok (within reasonable radius, of course). So, you can just order from the comfort of your hotel, like we did. We tried Chicken Cheese Momo and Pork Momo. Both of them were juicy and tender as they were freshly made. Shuffle Momos is located in Deorali Bazar, which is 1.5 km away from MG Marg. A very convenient place to make a stopover while returning from seven- or ten-point sightseeing trips, as most of these trips start and end from Deorali.
Reason to visit: Momos, momos, and some more momos
Location: MG Marg, Gangtok (Google Maps)
3. The Coffee Shop
This matter-of-factly named place is exactly what you think it would be and more. It offers a lot of options for, you guessed it, coffee-based beverages as well as a great selection of pizzas, pastas, steaks, and other continental cuisines. Located on the southern end of MG Marg, near Hotel Tashi Delek, overlooking the market and crowd, it is a great place to enjoy good food and rest your feet after roaming around for hours, or to start your day with scrumptious breakfast like we did with a spread of English Breakfast and Pulled Pork Sandwich. Also, they have a solid collection of vegetarian as well as vegan friendly options if you are looking for that while in Gangtok. The price is a little on the higher side, but it is completely justified by the quality of their ambience, service, and plating of food.
Reason to visit: Continental cuisine, hot and cold coffees
Location: MG Marg, Gangtok (Google Maps)
4. Osm Restro & Lounge
If you are looking for a place to have a romantic dinner overlooking MG Marg or having a meal with your family with a hint of fine dining, this is the place to be. They have a huge menu with a variety of multi cuisine dishes and drinks (more on their lounge section). This is one of those restaurants where you are going to like almost anything you order.
Reason to visit: Indian cuisine with a twist and dining with a view of MG Marg
Location: MG Marg, Gangtok (Google Maps)
5. Taste of Tibet
No list of restaurants in Gangtok is ever complete without mentioning this one. This place is famous for their offerings of local delicacies like momos, gyathuk (or Thukpa, a soupy noodle with meat), shyaphale (fried meat pies) etc. If you are looking for trying out any Tibetan or Sikkimese delicacies, this is the place to be. We tried their Beef Momo and it was delicious. However, the place is a little small for the number of people it attracts. And it could definitely be cleaner to maintain better hygiene.
Reason to visit: Indian cuisine with a twist and dining with a view of MG Marg
Location: MG Marg, Gangtok (Google Maps)
6. Café Live & Loud
This is the only place in our list that we haven’t actually been to. However, we are including it here as most of our friends who visited this place had really liked it. If you are looking for a vibrant atmosphere with live music, booze, and hookah in Gangtok, you must visit Café Live and Loud. They are located on the Tibet Road, just a couple of minutes’ walk away from MG Marg .
Reason to visit: Live music, hookah, and local beer
Location: MG Marg, Gangtok (Google Maps)
Apart from these, there are a few specific restaurants I’d like to mention for those times when you have a craving for a specific type of food, like we had for Kochi Pathar Jhol (tender mutton curry) while travelling to Darjeeling. However, we have not visited these restaurants in our trip and so, we cannot personally vouch for these. But given the crowd that we saw in front of these restaurants in Gangtok, it is perhaps safe to assume that they serve quality food as well. Here is the list…
- Babumashai for Bengali cuisine
- Khan Uncle’s Biriyani House for (you guessed it), Biriyani
- Masala the Restaurant for pure vegetarian North Indian
- Parivar for pure vegetarian South as well as North Indian
There it is. A list of restaurants in Gangtok that will definitely help you sort out your food plans. Most of these restaurants are in and around MG Marg as that is the most happening place in Gangtok with numerous shopping destinations and eateries. However, there are many restaurants and cafés sprinkled all around Gangtok, and even if you stay a little away from MG Marg, there is a good chance that you will stumble upon a decent place, maybe even better than some in this list. If you do so, please let us know in the comments section. We’ll add it to our list to help fellow travelers in the future.