Our Story

It started with a chef.

In the 1990s, our uncle Harmil Singh Mandair came to Oregon with something he had always known how to do: cook.

Before Oregon, Harmil spent years working as a chef aboard a ship. After coming to America, he continued working as a chef in a restaurant.

Harmil listened. He didn't have the money to build a large restaurant. But he had experience, determination, family — and an idea.

When food carts were still something new.

In 1997, Portland didn't look anything like the food-cart city it is today. There weren't giant food-cart pods everywhere, and there wasn't an established blueprint for what a full-service mobile kitchen should look like.

Our family remembers being there with Harmil and our father, talking with officials and working through questions about hoods and ventilation, multiple sinks, fresh-water systems, gray-water tanks and sanitation.

Oregon's mobile-food regulations were formally revised in 1997, with requirements covering important parts of mobile-food-unit operation. We don't claim Harmil personally wrote Oregon's food-cart laws. What we know is that our family was there during that early chapter, working through what it would take to operate a real kitchen on wheels.

And then Harmil built one.

Taste of India.

Harmil opened Taste of India in downtown Portland. At the time, Indian food carts were still unusual, and full-service mobile kitchens were even more unusual.

One important location in our family's early story was around SW 5th Avenue and Stark.

Even Harmil's name became part of the strange history of those early days. One newspaper article recorded his name incorrectly as “Hermaio Singh.” The name was wrong. The man was Harmil.

His story was just beginning.

Then came Indian Tandoori Oven.

Harmil wasn't the only one who believed food could build a future. His sister, Avtar Kaur, and her husband, Daljit Singh, became another important chapter in our family story.

Together, they built India Chaat House. By the early 2000s, it was serving customers at 12th & Yamhill in downtown Portland.

India Chaat House came right in 1998 as India Tandoori Oven had meat, and Avtar Kaur wanted to do something no one was, bring Indian Street Food to American Streets too. So she went Vegetarian with her cart and dumpped all the meat she served at India Tandoori Oven and instead sold Chaat with her new business, India Chaat House

Portland noticed. A 2003 Portland Mercury listing documented India Chaat House at 804 SW 12th & Yamhill. Later, Willamette Week readers recognized India Chaat House as a favorite lunch cart.

The Chaat House Wars.

Eventually, Avtar and Daljit went their separate ways in 2008. Daljit retained the original India Chaat House, while Avtar wasn't ready to walk away from the food — or the customers who loved it.

So she opened another cart:

The story became so unusual that Willamette Week called it “The Chaat House Wars.” Two Indian food carts. One family. Customers choosing sides. People even contacted Avtar asking her to come back.

For us, it's a funny story now. But it also showed just how much our family's food had become part of people's lives.

The name, the legacy & the family story.

Because our family's history goes back so far, there is one thing we want to make clear.

Over the years, Portland has had several independent businesses with similar names, including Taste of India, New Taste of India, Real Taste of India and Best Taste of India.

Some of the people behind these businesses were connected to the same small community of Indian entrepreneurs that Harmil knew. But similar names do not make them the same business.

As similar names appeared over the years, Harmil became frustrated by the confusion and eventually used the name Real Taste of India to distinguish his business and its history. Portland newspapers later documented Real Taste of India and New Taste of India operating near one another.

Today, you may see businesses using Taste of India or other similar names. Those are separate businesses and are not our family's India Chaat House or Bombay Chaat House.

We don't say this to take anything away from anyone else. We simply want our family's history to be remembered correctly. With out Harmil and Avtar, there would not have been 3rd class and 4th class business carts. They were the ones with a hand full of other carts that worked with Multnomah county to make it possible.

We never believed success was something to keep to ourselves.

Our family never believed that because we figured something out, we had to keep the knowledge to ourselves.

We helped people. We encouraged people. We showed people that a small cart could become a real business.

One example is Spella Caffè, which began as a Portland coffee cart before eventually becoming a permanent café.

We never wanted to be the only family that succeeded. We wanted to see other families succeed too.

Keizer, Oregon.

As India Chaat House grew, our family eventually expanded beyond Portland. Around 2005, we opened a restaurant in Keizer, Oregon.

It was proof that the little kitchen on wheels could become something bigger. But eventually, we lost the restaurant when the property changed ownership and the lease wasn't renewed.

Coming home.

In 2010, our family brought India Chaat House back into the family.

Two names that had traveled through different chapters of our family's history came together again:

Two names. One family. One history.

Harvey Singh & Isha Kaur.

Eventually, the responsibility of carrying that history fell to the next generation.

Harvey Singh could have chosen a completely different life. He had worked at Apple and had also built a career in massage.

But family called him back.

Harvey chose to leave those careers and continue the business his family had built. Because to him, this wasn't simply a job. It was his mother's story, his family's story, and a piece of Portland history.

And Harvey didn't do it alone.

His wife, Isha, stepped into that story with him. Together, Harvey and Isha became the next generation carrying the family's recipes, memories and traditions forward.

COVID changed Portland — but it didn't end our story.

Then came COVID.

Portland changed. Businesses closed. The streets changed. After years in downtown Portland, our family eventually had to leave.

For a moment, it felt like another chapter had ended.

But our family has never been very good at giving up.

After COVID, Scott Osmen gave our family an opportunity to start again in Aloha.

That opportunity became a new beginning — a new community and a new place to serve, but the same family, the same recipes and the same love for food. We settled in Aloha. But Harvey had been also building something new. Something Loco (crazy). Food that people would eat and say this is amazing.

He decided it was time. He opened in NE Portland in 2025. It was a huge success.

But he felt his energy was now in two locations. So he closed them both down.

And that brings us here.

Today, the story continues in SE Portland with Naan Loco.

India Chaat House. Bombay Chaat House. Now... Naan Loco.

The same family that started with Harmil. The same family that built India Chaat House. The same family that created Bombay Chaat House. The same family that survived changing locations, lost businesses, changing times and a pandemic.

And now another generation is carrying it forward, with a brand new way to eat, a taste that unites the world in one plate, but with the same flavors and taste your stomach loves.

Harvey Singh - Naan Loco - Today.

This is bigger than a food cart.

When we look back, we don't just see food carts.

We see people. Sacrifice. Immigrant families trying to build something in a new country. Brothers and sisters. Husbands and wives. Parents and children. People who helped one another. Customers who came back year after year. Recipes passed from one generation to another.

Our family didn't build Portland's food-cart culture alone. Hundreds of families helped make it what it is today.

But we were there.

We were part of that early generation, and we are proud that our family's story is part of Portland's story. You are the reason our story exisits to today. Your Support makes it possible.

Because food is never just food.

Harmil didn't start a food cart because he wanted to become famous.

He started because he had a family to take care of. He wanted to build something of his own. He wanted a better future.

Nearly 30 years later, that dream is still alive.

It lives in every recipe. Every plate. Every customer. Every family member who has stood behind the counter. And every person who has helped us along the way.

From Harmil to today.