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Our story

A cafe, a bakery, and a rather good view

You’ll find us just inside the gate of an old heritage building in Darjeeling, a kilometre or so below the Mall, where our family has been running Hotel Villa Everest for fifteen years. The deck was always the best thing about the place — on a clear morning you can sit out there with a cup in your hands and watch the light come up over Kanchenjunga — and after all those years of keeping it to ourselves, it seemed only right to open it up to everybody else. That, more or less, is how Everest Cafe came about.

The coffee is ground fresh for every cup rather than sitting about waiting, and the Darjeeling tea arrives as a proper pot, brewed and timed the way it ought to be. Everything from the bakery is made here on the premises, from scratch, first thing each morning: the sourdough is started a full two days before it reaches your table, the puff pastry is folded by hand, and the choux buns are split and filled the same day they come out of the oven. It all takes rather longer than it needs to, and that is very much the point.

The kitchen has grown comfortably wide over the years. There’s momo and thukpa made the way they’re made in these hills, a small Korean corner with bibimbap and black bean ramen, the North Indian plates you’d hope to find, and a proper Continental breakfast with eggs and hashbrowns for anyone heading out for the day. Whatever you’re in the mood for, there’s usually something here that’ll suit.

And although we sit inside the hotel gate, the cafe is open to absolutely everyone — just as welcome if you’ve wandered in off the road as if you’re staying with us upstairs. Come by for breakfast, come for a pot of tea in the afternoon, or simply come and sit on the deck a while and watch the mountains. We’d be very glad to see you.