The Best Mexican Food in Kathmandu (and the 1962 Story Behind It)

In 1962 there was no Mexican food in Kathmandu. There were no peppers of the right variety, no flour tortillas, no salsas, no precedent. There was a young American Peace Corps volunteer named Mike Frame, who had grown up in Minnesota eating his neighbour's tortillas, and who decided — on a hunch and with no kitchen experience — that he could put fajitas on a menu in Thamel.

It worked. Sixty-some years later, the Chicken Fajita Sizzler at Northfield Cafe is one of the most ordered single dishes in Thamel and the most consistent answer to the question "where can I get Mexican food in Kathmandu." This is its story, and the story of every other Mexican plate that followed.

How Mexican food came to Thamel

Mike Frame arrived in Kathmandu in 1962 with one of the very first U.S. Peace Corps cohorts to Nepal. He served his term, stayed, and in the 1970s opened a small café on Chaksibari Marg — a residential lane that would later become the back artery of tourist Thamel. He named the café after his hometown, Northfield, Minnesota. He named the bar he built next door after the outlaw who tried (and failed) to rob the First National Bank of Northfield in 1876 — Jesse James.

The first menu had American breakfast, simple sandwiches, and one Mexican dish: chicken fajitas. Why? Because Mike could make it from ingredients he could actually find in Kathmandu. Chicken, peppers, onions, soft flour tortillas (which had to be hand-rolled by the kitchen because no one was importing them), and a salsa improvised from local tomatoes and chillies. The iron plate that arrived sizzling at the table was a piece of theatre that worked — guests who had never eaten Mexican food anywhere ordered it, photographed it, and came back for it.

What to order today

Chicken Fajita Sizzler

NPR 580. The dish that built the restaurant. Marinated chicken seared on a screaming-hot iron plate with peppers and onions, served with soft flour tortillas, three salsas (mild tomato, smokier chipotle-style, and a green tomatillo-style), refried beans, sour cream and guacamole. The sizzle is part of the dish — the first thing you smell from the next table over. Order this if you order nothing else.

Nachos with Cheese

NPR 380. House-fried tortilla chips, melted yak-cheese blend (it works better than imported cheddar at altitude), jalapeños, sour cream, guacamole. Generous portion — comfortable as a starter for two or a meal for one with a beer.

Chimichangas

NPR 480. Crisp-fried wheat tortillas stuffed with spiced chicken or refried beans, finished with cheese and a salsa verde. The off-fajita order — same flavour family, less theatre, more crunch.

Breakfast Burrito

NPR 420. Scrambled eggs, refried beans, peppers and cheese rolled in a soft flour tortilla. Available from 7:00 AM. The post-trek breakfast of the people who made it back to Kathmandu late the night before.

Other Mexican options in Kathmandu

In the sixty years since 1962, other Thamel restaurants have added Mexican dishes to their menus. The honest answer is that none of them specialise — most do Mexican as one cuisine of many, the way we do American or Indian. The dishes that succeed in Thamel kitchens are the ones close to American Tex-Mex (fajitas, burritos, nachos, quesadillas), not regional Mexican cooking. If you arrive in Kathmandu expecting elotes or birria or proper Oaxacan mole, manage your expectations downward.

For Mexican food in the rest of the city: there is a Cinco de Mayo branch in Lazimpat and a couple of Mexican-named places in Jhamsikhel that come and go. Northfield is the long-running answer in Thamel itself.

Why it still works after sixty years

Three reasons. First, the recipes have not changed — Mike Frame's original fajita marinade is still the marinade. Second, the kitchen is genuinely practiced; we make hundreds of fajita orders a month and no one in our kitchen has to look up the recipe. Third, the dish is right for the room — a sizzling iron plate landing on a candlelit garden table beside a wood-burning fire pit is a piece of theatre that has worked since the 1970s and shows no sign of stopping.