New Delhi, April 18, 2025: Some afternoons are designed to linger. The kind where the light falls just right, the conversation never quite finds a reason to end, and every pour feels like it was meant for exactly this moment.
From NV Group, one of India’s largest alco-bev companies, which houses two distinct spirits segments – Mohulo, India’s first art-forward sipping gin crafted around the culturally rich Mahua flower, and Smoke Lab Vodka, a premium Indian vodka known for its craft distillation, clean profile and contemporary positioning, came together at Le Cirque at The Leela Palace, New Delhi, for a guided tasting luncheon built around a single, focused idea: that a well-made spirit deserves to be experienced with the same thoughtfulness as a well-composed dish.
Hosted by founders Varun and Sanya Jain, the afternoon brought together an intimate table of XVI celebrating Smoke Lab Vodka and Mohulo Gin, along with a carefully chosen table of names from the worlds of media, culture, and taste. The noon witnessed notable names like Nandini Bhalla, Ruchika Mehta, Aindrila Mitra, Rahul Gangwani, Nipun Goenka, Managing Director, Pro Chancellor – GD Goenka Group; Luxury Resort & Holiday-wear designers-Shivan Bhatia & Narresh Kukreja; Sandeep Lodha, Sasha Grewal, founder Outhouse Jewellery, Orhan Awatramani, and Podcast host, Priyanka Raina, among others, each bringing their own discerning eye to an afternoon that rewarded exactly that.
The afternoon moved the way a good meal should, slowly, deliberately, with each moment building quietly on the last. Cocktails welcomed the room before the luncheon took its place, and with it, a carefully considered progression that gave each spirit the space to speak. Each course arrived not merely alongside a Smoke Lab expression, but in conversation with it. The Smooth Classic eased the table in. The Aniseed unfolded with aromatic depth. Saffron leaned warmly into indulgence. The Green Chilli Mango arrived with a boldness that surprised and then convinced. And the Liquid Gold drew the savoury arc to a close with a quiet richness that stayed long after the glass was empty.
The main course belonged to Mohulo, India’s first art-forward sipping gin, distilled from the Mahua flower. A bloom that carries centuries of cultural memory within it. Paired with Le Cirque’s Franco-Italian culinary sensibility, it felt less like a food-and-drink pairing and more like two deeply rooted worlds choosing, for one afternoon, to share a table.
That, perhaps, is the truest way to understand what Smoke Lab has always stood for. Founded as India’s first premium craft vodka, it was built on a conviction that the Indian palate has always had something distinct and worthwhile to say in the global spirits dialogue. Mohulo carries that same conviction into gin, drawing its identity from an ingredient that is deeply, specifically, unapologetically Indian. And Le Cirque, born in New York and shaped by a legacy of French cooking with Italian inflection, brought a dining sensibility to the afternoon that matched, note for note, the ambition of what was being poured.
What the afternoon revealed was something rarer than a successful pairing, a study in contrast finding harmony. Smoke Lab’s distinctly Indian character meets a Franco-Italian legacy not in competition, but in complement. A cohesive expression of innovation, heritage, and luxury that felt as inevitable as it did singular.
For everyone in that room, it was exactly what the best experiences always are, over too soon, and impossible to forget.
