Mumbai's most enduring street food has a new address in Flower Mound, Texas. Curry Up Now at 2717 Cross Timbers Rd, Suite 400, Flower Mound, TX serves pav bhaji as part of its Indian street food menu, cooked the way it is meant to be made: on a flat iron griddle, spiced with pav bhaji masala, and served with properly buttered rolls. For anyone who has been looking for this dish in the western DFW suburbs without success, the search ends at Cross Timbers Road. Open daily from 11am to 9pm. Phone: (214) 222-5596.
Where Pav Bhaji Comes From and Why It Still Matters
Pav bhaji was born in Mumbai in the 1850s. It developed as a practical meal for textile mill workers in the Girgaon and Worli neighborhoods who needed something fast, filling, affordable, and full of flavor between long factory shifts. A street vendor would take whatever seasonal vegetables were available, cook them down on a large flat griddle called a tawa with onions, tomatoes, and a specific spice blend called pav bhaji masala, mash them together into a thick, rich bhaji, and serve it with soft, buttered bread rolls called pav.
Pav is the bread: small, soft, slightly sweet rolls with Portuguese origins from Goa's colonial history. Bhaji is the vegetable preparation. The two are eaten together, the pav pressed into the bhaji and eaten in combination, never separately. The dish spread from Mumbai's mill neighborhoods to the city's famous Chowpatty Beach, where it became one of the most recognized street foods in India. Today it is eaten across the country, but the Mumbai preparation remains the reference standard.
What makes pav bhaji exceptional when it is made correctly is the cooking technique. The bhaji is not a soup or a curry. It is a mash, worked together on the tawa with repeated pressing and folding until the vegetables lose their individual identity and become a single, dense, spiced whole. The pav bhaji masala blend, which includes dry mango powder, fennel, cumin, coriander, and dried red chili, gives the bhaji its characteristic tang and warmth. A pat of butter finishes the bhaji before it is plated. The pav is toasted cut-side down on the same griddle in butter until the cut surface is golden. You eat them together. That is the dish.
Pav Bhaji as Part of the Flower Mound Street Food Experience
Pav bhaji does not exist in isolation on the Curry Up Now menu in Flower Mound. It sits within a street food section that covers the full range of North Indian and Mumbai street food culture. Order pav bhaji alongside kachori chaat and you get two of the most beloved North Indian street food preparations in a single shared starter spread. The kachori chaat brings crunch, tang, and cool yogurt. The pav bhaji brings warmth, richness, and the deeply satisfying quality of a long-cooked preparation. These two dishes have been eaten side by side on North Indian street corners for decades.
Pav bhaji also connects directly to other items across the menu in ways that are worth knowing. The pav bhaji topping option on the Naughty Naan Indian pizza puts the same spiced vegetable mash on a naan flatbread base alongside caramelized onions, jalapeño, mozzarella, and cotija cheese. This is not a standard preparation anywhere else in DFW. It is Curry Up Now's specific invention: Mumbai street food as a pizza topping. For the kids bowl, pav bhaji-adjacent mild vegetable preparations make the kids section one of the more thoughtfully calibrated children's menus in the area. And if you are ordering a Tikka Masala Burrito as your main, pav bhaji as a starter gives the table an authentic Mumbai opening before the Indo-Californian main course arrives.
Why the Pav Bhaji at Curry Up Now Flower Mound Is the Right Version
Pav bhaji prepared correctly requires three things that most Indian restaurants outside of dedicated street food kitchens do not invest in: a flat iron tawa, a kitchen that knows the pav bhaji masala sequence, and an understanding that the dish is about texture as much as flavor.
Curry Up Now was built from a food truck. The street food program is not an addition to the main menu. It is the main menu. The kitchen at the Flower Mound location, which opened in June 2025 under co-owners Kiki Khajuria and Samy Kilaru, carries the same preparation standards that Akash and Rana Kapoor established when they launched the brand in Burlingame, California in 2009. When Kilaru described the food at the Flower Mound opening, he said: "The food is flavorful, never just spicy, and appeals to everyone." That description applies to pav bhaji specifically. The masala warmth is present but not aggressive. The butter richness is there but not heavy. The tang from the amchur in the pav bhaji masala brightens the whole preparation. It is a complete dish.
The pav bhaji at Curry Up Now is also fully plant-based in its base form. The bhaji contains no meat products. Requesting the pav without butter keeps the entire dish vegan without any substitution required. This is not an adaptation of the dish. It is the dish as it was originally made in Mumbai. For Flower Mound's vegetarian and vegan community, pav bhaji is one of the most satisfying and culturally authentic options on the entire menu.
All dietary and allergen information for pav bhaji and every other item is available on the allergens page. Catering inquiries for events where pav bhaji is part of a shared street food spread can be submitted at curryupnow.com/catering-event. The store locator covers every Curry Up Now location across California, Texas, North Carolina, and Georgia.
Mumbai's Street Food Has Found Its Flower Mound Address
Pav bhaji has been feeding people in Mumbai for over 170 years. It arrived in Flower Mound in June 2025. The address is 2717 Cross Timbers Rd, Suite 400, Flower Mound, TX 75028. Order it alongside kachori chaat, follow it with a Tikka Masala Burrito or Naughty Naan, and finish with whatever the table still wants to share. The kitchen is open every day, 11am to 9pm. Order online at curryupnow.com/flower-mound or walk in.
Pav bhaji is the best starting point on this menu, but it is not the only dish worth understanding in depth. The Tikka Masala Burrito is the founding dish of the entire Curry Up Now brand and the strongest individual portion for group orders. The Kachori Chaat pairs most naturally with pav bhaji as a shared street food spread. The Naughty Naan carries pav bhaji as a topping option, which is worth knowing before you order. For groups planning a catered event around the street food menu, the birthday catering guide and corporate catering guide cover how pav bhaji fits into a full event spread.
FAQs
What is pav bhaji?
A Mumbai street food dish: spiced mashed vegetables cooked on a flat iron griddle with pav bhaji masala, served with soft buttered bread rolls. It originated in Mumbai's textile mill neighborhoods in the 1850s.
Where can I get pav bhaji in Flower Mound?
Curry Up Now at 2717 Cross Timbers Rd, Suite 400, Flower Mound, TX 75028. On the Indian street food menu, open daily 11am to 9pm. Phone: (214) 222-5596.
Is pav bhaji vegan?
The bhaji is fully plant-based. Requesting the pav without butter keeps the entire dish vegan with no modification or substitution required.
Is pav bhaji halal?
Yes. Pav bhaji contains no meat products and is prepared in Curry Up Now's halal-certified kitchen at the Flower Mound location.
Is pav bhaji spicy?
The spice level is moderate: warm, tangy, and aromatic from the pav bhaji masala, but not aggressively hot. Suitable for most palates including first-timers.
What should I order alongside pav bhaji?
Kachori chaat as a starter companion, then a Tikka Masala Burrito or Naughty Naan as the main. Both the naan and the pav bhaji are available as a combined experience on the Naughty Naan menu, where pav bhaji is a topping option.
Can I order pav bhaji for catering in Flower Mound?
Yes. Pav bhaji as part of a street food catering spread is available through curryupnow.com/catering-event or (214) 222-5596.
