• Courtesy Of Dosa Kitchen / Kristin Teig
• Dosa from Dosa Kitchen

Dosa Kitchen has been bringing South Indian soul food to Brattleboro since 2014, and now the owners of the popular food truck are preparing to open their first brick-and-mortar establishment.

Married co-owners Nash Patel and Leda Scheintaub, who are also the authors of Dosa Kitchen: Recipes for India's Favorite Street Food, will open at 34 Elliot Street in downtown Brattleboro in late 2019. The restaurant will have a menu similar to that of the food truck — typically parked outside Retreat Farm beside Grafton Village Cheese — featuring the eponymous tangy, airy South Indian rice-and-lentil crêpes.

Scheintaub said the new space was "too good to pass up"; Dosa Kitchen will adjoin Peter Havens in the former home of that restaurant's deli, Peter Haven's Fine Provisions. The restaurant will focus on lunch, offering an expanded version of the food truck's menu and daily specials such as Patel's biryani, a complex, layered rice dish synonymous with his native Hyderabad.

"Normally I only get to eat Nash's biryani on my birthday, so now other people will get to eat it, too," Scheintaub said.

The permanent location will allow the couple to offer special dinners and develop products such as Leda's Ladoos — Scheintaub's line of Indian sweets — while continuing to operate the food truck. Scheintaub said the menu will reflect their commitment to sourcing local produce and humanely raised meat; all items will still be gluten-free.

The food truck will be open at 400 Linden Street through October 14 and at the Brattleboro Farmers Market in November and December. Diners have made it a destination, seeking out both its traditional and fusion offerings.

"We get Indian tourists who are looking for their food," Patel said. "They can be skeptical at first and will order one dosa to taste the sambar [an accompanying condiment] and see if they can trust you. So far, they've always come back to order more."