Mythily: How Top Chef Contestant Rasika Is Bringing South Indian Soul to Brooklyn

Hi, I’m Rasika. I’m the chef and one of the founders of Mythily. Mythily is named after my Paatti, my grandmom. She was my first teacher in cooking locally, long before farm-to-table was a phrase anyone put on a menu. For her, it was never a trend or a philosophy. It was simply how you cooked: you used what was good, what was near, what was in season. That’s the foundation I grew up on, and I didn’t realize until much later how deeply it had shaped the way I think about food.

That upbringing, paired with a sheer curiosity for the craft, eventually took me a long way from my Paatti’s kitchen. I trained at some of the most demanding kitchens in the country – three-Michelin-starred The French Laundry, and then Mourad, the one-Michelin-starred restaurant in San Francisco where I worked my way up to head chef by the time I was twenty-three. That’s where I learned technique, discipline, and how much care a single plate can hold. I’m grateful for every bit of it. But for a long time I was cooking other people’s visions, in other people’s traditions.

It wasn’t until I competed on Top Chef that I truly found my voice. I made a decision that surprised even me: I would cook South Indian flavors for every single challenge. No hedging, no translating it into something more “familiar.” Just inspiration from the food I grew up with. This was the moment where something clicked and I knew this was what I was supposed to be doing.

Building Mythily, one pop-up at a time

Two years ago, my partner Ashwathi and I built the foundation of Mythily. We started doing pop-ups all over New York, sharing food that was a nostalgic ode to South Indian cooking with creative takes layered on top. The flavors of home, reimagined.

The idea at the heart of it has stayed constant. We’re inspired by those nostalgic flavors and the process of making them, but we want to blend that with the bounty of what’s available locally, right here. When you do that, you actually create something extraordinarily flavorful, because you’re combining the best of two worlds: the techniques and memory of South Indian cooking, and the produce and abundance of New York. That combination, plus everything I’ve cultivated over the years in my career is what creates the food at Mythily.

Watch our Kickstarter video to see Mythily and meet the team →

Community is our Core

Opening a restaurant in New York is a huge undertaking, and I still can’t quite believe we hit our Kickstarter goal in 41 hours. Forty-one hours. I don’t really have the words for it, but it told me something I’ll never forget: this is a place our community actually wants. It’s the difference between building something we thought people cared about, to knowing just how much they care and what this means to each and everyone of us. 

But hitting this goal isn’t the end, it’s the start. We’re going for our stretch goals now. Everything past our goal goes straight into making Mythily last and becoming sustainable: finishing out the kitchen, paying our team well from the very first day, and giving us enough cushion to get through a first year that’s hard on every new restaurant. This industry can be brutal, and we’re dedicated to embarking on this adventure through a strong foundation. 

And that’s really all I want is for this place to still be here in ten years. To keep cooking the food I grew up on, the way my Paatti taught me (obviously with my personal flair), somewhere permanent. Somewhere my family, and yours, can keep coming back to.

So if you’ve read this and are excited about our vision or our food, or you just want to see us make it, our Kickstarter is still live and every bit helps us build something that lasts, you can find it here: Mythily: South Indian Soul, Brooklyn Energy. Back us, share it with someone who’d love it, or just come eat with us when we open. It all means more than I can say.

We’d love for you to help us start this new chapter, alongside the community that has carried us here.

Back Mythily on Kickstarter: kickstarter.com/projects/mythily

Rasika Venkatesa is the chef and co-founder of Mythily, a progressive South Indian restaurant opening in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. She trained at three-Michelin-starred The French Laundry and became head chef at one-Michelin-starred Mourad by age 23, before competing on Top Chef Season 21, where she cooked South Indian food for every challenge. Mythily is named for her grandmother, who first taught her to cook in Chennai.