Hyderabad--:--IST
Right now, across Hyderabad, biryani is coming out of our kitchens almost faster than it can be plated.
Narayanguda · 2006
A plate full of biryani for one person, at
That was twenty years ago.
It was around 700 grams of biryani, priced for one person, and the idea behind it was simple: do not make the plate smaller to make the price lower. It was made for the students next door, the bachelors living away from home and anyone who wanted a proper biryani on an ordinary day. The idea caught on, and many biryani restaurants in Hyderabad sell a single today. Twenty years on, the plate is still as full as it was.
The question behind the price
It is not a discount or a trick. It is a loop that has run since 2006, and each step pays for the next one.
How a plate full of biryani stays within reach
Rice, spices and meat come straight from farms and manufacturers, so no distributor or wholesaler adds a margin.
A Single is around 700 grams for one person. The plate is never made smaller to make the price lower.
A price people can afford brings more of them to the table, and they keep coming back.
Bigger orders get better terms from the same suppliers, and the saving goes back into the plate.
The most orders of any restaurant in India
Zomato Restaurant Awards · 2023
The business grows through volume, and the plate stays the priority. It is the same loop that has run since 2006.
A recreation of Grand Hotel being built in 1935. No photograph from that year exists.
Abids, 1935
In 1935, biryani in Hyderabad still belonged mostly to palaces, nawabs and weddings. Grand Hotel opened in Abids and served it to anyone who walked through its door, which helped make biryani something the whole city could order.
And it is still open
It is run today by Mr. Jaleel Rooz. Keeping a restaurant that old going takes work every single day, and he is still the one doing it.
2006
It was not a second Grand Hotel. It was a new restaurant under a new name, opened in Narayanguda with his partner, Mr. Mubeen Pasha, and it was called Mehfil, which means a gathering.
With one idea
The plate was generous for the price on purpose, so that a good biryani could be an everyday meal rather than a special occasion. That was the whole point in 2006, and it is still the point today.
2006 to 2011
For five years there was only the restaurant in Narayanguda, and everything Mehfil does today was worked out there first. The second Mehfil opened in Attapur in 2011, and seventeen more have followed since.
Twenty years on
Mehfil was started by a man who already had a seventy-one-year-old hotel to run, and who chose to build something new beside it. Twenty years later, both are still open.
One pot, cooked on dum
Rice goes on last, then the lid is sealed and it finishes on dum.
00:0000:43
Three seconds, frame by frame
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Recognition
Mehfil has won more than 50 awards since 2017. Here are six of them, and the first means the most to us, because it was earned one order at a time.
All 19 named awards More than 50 since 2017
Hyderabad, and Dubai
It began with one restaurant in 2006. Mehfil has never run a big advertising campaign, and most people still find us because someone told them about us. Scroll on and watch the city fill up.
Biryani from eleven in the morning until midnightMost open at five for Irani chai
Easy to miss
Most people come in for the biryani and stop at the bakery counter on the way out. It sells cakes, pastries, puffs, pizzas, burgers, sandwiches and biscuits, and it stays open as long as the restaurant does.
Cakes, whole or by the slice01
Black forest, butterscotch and pineapple cakes, bought whole for a celebration or by the slice with your chai. Ask at the counter and they will make an eggless one.
Take something home02
The counter is inside the restaurant, so a cake or a box of biscuits can go home with you after dinner.
Pizza, crispy wings and rolls03
For the days you want something other than biryani, there are pizzas, crispy chicken wings, rolls and biscuits.
Sandwiches, burgers and pastries04
Grilled sandwiches and burgers share the counter with the cakes and pastries, so something sweet and something savoury can go home in the same bag.
Bakery counters at 12 of the 17 in HyderabadEggless cakes on request
Eleven in the morning until midnight
For twenty years you have filled our tables every night, first in one restaurant and now in nineteen. Thank you. We have never once taken it for granted.
