When New York's starchy Le Cirque Restaurant opened its first branch in Asia two years ago – in India's capital New Delhi – its chef complained that diners would request him to butcher delicately prepared lamb noisettes to make them easier to share family-style.
Two years later, the French-Italian restaurant seems to be engaged in a passionate love affair with India. This month, Le Cirque Signature opened at the Leela Mumbai hotel, where one reviewer said it would likely claim a "comfy niche," even though it may have lost its cachet back home.
In early 2014, Le Cirque will open in Bangalore, and then in Chennai, either late next year or early in 2015, said Rashmi Vasisht, director of public relations for The Leela Palaces, Hotels and Resort chain, the India partner for the Maccioni Group, the family-run business that owns Le Cirque. For a restaurant that offers a T-bone steak for two at 7,950 rupees (about $130), far more than what most Indians earn in a month, that's a pretty rapid expansion.
"People are willing to spend more than even before, because restaurants are fast replacing other forms of entertainment," said Rashmi Uday Singh, a Mumbai-based food writer. "Just like we no longer need to go abroad to buy Reeboks, we no longer need to go abroad to eat fine food."
Even though India's super-rich make up a tiny share of the population, there are still enough of them to make it worthwhile for these restaurants to invest in setting up here. Like Le Cirque, several fine dining establishments plan to expand their locations next year, while some top chefs plan to set up a first outpost. The process is lengthy though, and does involve some tricky logistics.
Prashant Issar, vice president of operations at Ka Hospitality, the company that brought London-based restaurateur Alan Yau's Chinese spots Hakkasan and Yauatcha to Mumbai in 2011, says the planning stage for each lasted 16 months.
The Indian outposts have to adhere to the standards of the parent restaurants, making the process of starting and sustaining the restaurant expensive, added Mr. Issar. Hakkasan and Yauatcha each has a prestigious Michelin star, awarded by a highly regarded French food guide. The most a restaurant can have is three stars, but even a single star is coveted.
"We have to provide our expatriate chefs with the same ingredients and equipment they're used to in London," said Mr. Issar.
Indian diners have also come to scrutinize menus closely, he said. "People want, for example, line-caught wild sea bass from the North Atlantic, and they want to know that's what they're eating," said Mr. Issar.
In spite of the challenges, Yauatcha expanded to Bangalore and Delhi this year, and Mr. Issar says his company plans to open a branch in Kolkata in 2014.
While Delhi was the first to get Le Cirque, as well as the "modern Japanese" establishment Megu, the swanky imported restaurant is most common in Mumbai.
In 2012, Sergi Arola, also a Michelin-starred chef, started Arola, a Spanish restaurant at the J.W. Marriott hotel in Mumbai, adding to the city's small collection of globally acclaimed chefs. Vineet Bhatia, who opened Ziya, a restaurant that serves contemporary Indian cuisine at the Oberoi hotel, and Thailand's Ian Kittichai, who opened Koh at the InterContinental hotel, offering what some food writers describe as "Thai tapas," were two of the earliest arrivals in 2010.
Historically, the priciest restaurants have been strategically placed in upmarket hotels, which are guaranteed patronage from foreign travelers, and many of the new arrivals continue that tradition. But in recent years, swanky restaurants have emerged outside the hotels as well. In Mumbai, Hakkasan and Yauatcha are located in the city's trendy Bandra neighborhood, both in office buildings.
Restaurateurs say that a fair portion of high pricing at top-end restaurants is due to the cost of importing ingredients, particularly meat and fish, to India, because many of the menu items are not locally available. Kolkata-born chef Gaggan Anand says the issue of the availability of ingredients was the main reason he opened his Indian molecular gastronomy eatery in Thailand (but now even Mr. Anand says he is planning to open in Mumbai) rather than India.
Le Cirque, for example, imports its Dover sole, a dish that costs nearly $50, from the iconic English coast; the carpaccio is flown in from Manhattan, and the black truffle, grated at the last moment onto a creamy risotto, is brought in from Italy.
But these restaurants can't survive solely by perfectly reproducing the overseas culinary experience.
Like the mass-market chains that have arrived in recent years bearing mango doughnuts and Konkani twists, the top flight spots also tailor their menus to local sensibilities, with a particular emphasis on vegetarian options — though they eschew Indian spices for the most part.
Mumbai Le Cirque chef Matteo Boglione, who has spent more than half his life cooking innovative French and Italian cuisine for notoriously demanding Manhattan diners at various restaurants including the flagship Le Cirque, now four decades old, is now grappling with the specific needs of Indian diners, such as Jain vegetarians, whose religious sensibilities forbid them onion and garlic.
For his first Jain customers, he prepared spicy vegetable pasta without onions and garlic and an asparagus soup. "They were happy, and it was a good challenge," said the chef.
Mr. Boglione has also adapted his classic roasted cauliflower salad with buffalo mozzarella, porcini and avocado panzanella, and black truffle shavings into a vegetarian main course, a cauliflower flan that costs about $20. Nearly half the menu is vegetarian, the chef said.
Mr. Boglione will not, however, be putting his personal favorite on the Mumbai menu. That's the Lampredotto panini, a typical Florentine street sandwich stuffed with meat from the fourth stomach of a cow.
"In Italy, it's a delicacy, but I would never serve that here," he said.
Follow Shanoor on Twitter @shanoorseervai. Follow India Real Time on Twitter @WSJIndia.
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