Chef Oza and the Himalaya Restaurant
The Himalaya Restaurant was without a doubt the best Indian Restaurant in the Detroit Metropolitan area from it’s opening in the early 1970s until it finally closed in 2010. Chef Oza, who has cooked for such notables as Indira Gandhi and Henry Ford II prepared each meal to order from scratch using spices he brought personally from India. He was preparing Ayurvedic meals in the early 1970s before most westerners had even heard the word Ayurveda. Customers often commented that they felt good for several days after eating at the Himalaya. While his food was certainly good medicine for those who ate it, the taste was something incredible that kept loyal American customers fighting the Ambassador Bridge traffic for the sumptuous meal that lay on the other side of the Detroit River for the 40 years the restaurant remained open. Prior to closing the restaurant, a small group of loyal customers worked with Chef Oza every Sunday for a year to put together a cookbook of recipes from the Himalaya Restaurant, including longtime secrets of his unique Mulligatawny Soup, Poori Dahl, Kofta Curry and Mango Drink. He also included many “old granny” recipes that did not make it into the Himalaya Menu.
