After 200K+ votes, this Indian restaurant was crowned best in the Triangle

Once, a group of friends studying at an engineering college in India jokingly pitched the ultimate career pivot: ditching their engineering degrees to debut their dream restaurant.

Now after 25 years, those roommates turned restaurant co-owners are officially claiming the title of the top Indian spot in the Triangle.

For the News & Observer’s latest food and dining poll, nearly 50 nominations poured in of delicious dining spots around Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill.

After a month-long spicy showdown with hundreds of thousands of votes, the culinary champion that came out on top is a local newcomer that’s only been in business for a few months: Barsa | New Indian.

Best Indian restaurant in the Triangle: Barsa | New Indian

Location: 105 W. Morgan St., Suite 100, Durham, NC 27701

Barsa may have opened its doors in downtown Durham this spring, but this has been a concept years in the making — one Chandrasekhar Yadla and his friends decided to fully pursue about two years ago.

While he and his other co-owners come from the engineering industry, they all grew up with a passion for cooking. So you’ll see a lot of their favorite Indian dishes, including “authentic street food inspirations and contemporary, chef-driven creations,” like its gunpowder lamb chops and spiced chicken pilaf. There are also several cocktails, mocktails, Indian beers and nearly 30 wines, which are on display beside the bar.

A nod to its name, which translates to “rain,” the corner restaurant illuminated with natural light thanks to floor to ceiling windows is also covered with colored umbrellas hanging above the dining room.

“After a rainy day, everything feels fresh and new … so that is the whole concept that we are bringing with our food, as well as our drinks,” Yadla, co-owner of the restaurant told The News & Observer about its menu made up of dishes with locally sourced ingredients, spices grounded in-house and drinks with freshly squeezed juices.

Though its menu may be small, each item is intended to bring its own unique flavor, which he says allows them to keep things fresh in the kitchen. To be specific, you won’t even find the same sauce in more than one dish.

“It started with the idea to come up with very basics. We don’t want to use a lot of spices and every dish should say something different,” he said. “We are bringing as much as we can to the table.”

To be named the best Indian restaurant in the Triangle, the team holds a lot of gratitude and now a responsibility to deliver that honor.

“They have to have a very good experience. There needs to be a takeaway in the form of a memory or the quality of food, the presentation,” Sunny Singh, general manager, explained.

“When they leave this restaurant, there should be smiles on their faces ... Whoever is coming in, we make sure it’s all about experience. We make sure that they feel the money was well spent and that they’d want to come back again and again.”

Best Indian restaurant in the Triangle finalist: Bazil

Location: 6602 Glenwood Ave., Suite 1, Raleigh, NC 27612

Similarly to Barsa, another newcomer to the local food scene was also a top contender for the tastiest Indian cuisine in the area.

Founded in 2022, Raleigh’s Bazil is a family affair, run by chef and owner Arti Kumar with her son, Abhi, as general manager.

Growing up with a big brother who was a chef at his own restaurant India, she developed a love for cooking at a very young age. Eventually, that inspired her to follow in his footsteps — with a grocery store in Italy and now one of the best Indian restaurants in the Triangle.

“She got a lot of influence from her brother … That’s when her love for cooking and experimenting really kind of grew for her — of putting together dishes that you wouldn’t really see at Indian restaurants like sea bass, octopus, lobster and blending those in with the traditional Indian techniques,” her son, Abhi, told The N&O.

“Everything that you see here, it’s all her creation from spices to samosas to the nan.”

In addition to classic dishes like butter chicken and biryani, the restaurant’s menu is also curated with flavors from other cuisines as well.

“Being in the South, many international cuisines are popping up … but when we started, there was not many of them around here…We wanted to build to that American taste … or even Asian cuisine, and just take from other cultures and build them together and introduce something new to people,” he explained.

“That was really the whole concept behind it. The traditional Indian dishes, use those same techniques but incorporate new items, new seafood, new poultry and showcase a selection that a lot of Indian restaurants are not doing at the moment.”

Along with its chef-driven menu of “comfort classics and innovative creations,” Bazil also has a wide variety of Indian wines, whiskeys, handcrafted seasonal cocktails and specialty desserts.

“I want to share how deeply grateful I am for this journey. Every recipe at Bazil reflects my roots, my passion for food, and the incredible team that brings it all to life,” Chef Arti Kumar said in an email to The N&O. “None of this would be possible without the support of our regular diners who return week after week, the first-time visitors who give us a chance, and my family here in the U.S. and abroad who have stood by me throughout this dream.”

This story was originally published September 30, 2025 at 12:53 PM with the headline "After 200K+ votes, this Indian restaurant was crowned best in the Triangle."