Toronto-based restaurateur Hemant Bhagwani, who has eateries in Toronto and New York, is take over the Preston Street space.
Katha, a trailblazing fine-dining restaurant on Preston Street that served innovative Indian-inspired dishes on its tasting menus, is to close at the end of January, about 16 months after it opened.
“I’m proud of what I’ve achieved,” chef-owner Teegavarapu Sarath Mohan said Sunday in an interview. Katha opened with a splash and “we felt really accepted,” he said.
But he continued: “2024 was extremely slow for us. We had a really difficult time just surviving. I should have closed six months ago.”
Mohan, a 34-year-old, self-taught chef who has owned restaurants in Ottawa for the last six years, even competed last fall in the Ottawa regional qualifier for the 2025 Canadian Culinary Championship, to be held in Ottawa at the end of January.
He did not win the qualifier. “I knew if I was not going to win it, I was going to close very soon,” Mohan said.
He said that Katha’s space is to be taken over by the Toronto-based Indo-Canadian chef and restaurateur Hemant Bhagwani, who has restaurants in Toronto and New York. Mohan hopes he and his staff at Katha will be able to work at Bhagwani’s new Ottawa venture when it opens later in 2025.
Eight years ago, Mohan distinguished himself as the chef at Flavours of Kerala in Kanata. He left that business to open NH44, inspired by India’s street food, in a Lancaster Road industrial park. Early during the COVID-19 pandemic, he closed NH44 and moved to his current Preston Street location, where he opened the more fancy restaurant Vivaan. In September 2023, he rebranded Vivaan as Katha, and made its food and concept more elevated. At Katha, chefs who were very much invested in their dishes served guests and related the backstories behind their creations.
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But Mohan said that he, like many restaurateurs, was saddled with debt incurred during the pandemic, and that he did not want his staff to suffer further due to Katha’s financial woes. “It’s not fair for them to be a part of what I’m going through,” he said.
And while Ottawa has seen dozens of new Indian restaurants open in the last few years, in part to serve an influx of Indian students, Mohan said that Katha, while beloved by some fans of fine dining, may have been a culinary concept that Ottawa wasn’t yet ready for.
“The city has seen a particular (Indian) food for 30 to 35 years. I’m not sure if they can move on from butter chicken or curries,” said Mohan. “Maybe I’m too ahead of what the city wants.”
He said that, for its final month, Katha would offer, in addition to its elevated tasting menu, some of Mohan’s “greatest hits” from his previous restaurants and takeout dinners for two.
After an Instagram post announced Katha’s upcoming closure, well-wishers expressed their dismay.
“So sad to hear this. You have the most spirited kitchen brigade in the city,” wrote Jennifer Campbell, who was a judge at the Ottawa qualifying event last fall.
“Extremely talented and passionate team,” responded Ottawa chef Phil Cameron.
Mohan wrote that he hopes the Katha team can still come together in the future to flex its creative muscles at pop-up events and collaborations with other Ottawa eateries. Justin Champagne-Lagarde, chef-owner of the fine-dining restaurant Perch, wrote on Instagram that he would be happy to have such an event at his own Preston Street restaurant.
Would Mohan like to own another restaurant down the road? He did not discount the possibility. “But not any time soon,” he said.
