21 Restaurants for Others.
Now, One for Himself.

There’s a food truck parked behind the Motel 6 on Office Plaza Drive in West Des Moines that has been quietly changing people’s dinner plans. No flashy signage on a busy boulevard. No prime real estate on a trendy strip. Just the smell of something extraordinary drifting across a parking lot, and a growing crowd of regulars who have already figured out what the rest of the city is missing.

That truck is The Guntur Talkies. And if you haven’t found it yet, Chef Shankar would like a word with you.

From Guntur to Gold Medal

Chef Shankar grew up in Guntur, a city in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh that is legendary throughout the country for one thing above all else: its chiles. Guntur produces some of the hottest, most flavorful peppers in India, and the regional cuisine bears that identity proudly — layered, complex, and unapologetically bold. It’s the flavor palette that shaped him from childhood, working alongside his father in the family restaurant before he ever set foot in a professional kitchen.

But Shankar didn’t stop at the family table. He pursued formal hotel management training and emerged a gold medalist in a national culinary competition — a distinction that opened the world to him. He went on to cook aboard the Costa Cruise Line, the Italian-based fleet that carries passengers across European waters, before eventually making his way to the United States fifteen years ago. He spent that decade and a half as a head chef — not just at one restaurant, but at twenty-one of them. He built kitchens, designed menus, and trained teams for other people’s dreams for the better part of two decades. Then, four months ago, he decided it was time to build one for himself.

The name says everything about who he is. “Guntur” honors his hometown. “Talkies” is the South Asian word for a movie theater — a place where people gather, stories unfold, and something memorable always happens. Put them together and you have the whole philosophy in two words: the flavors of Guntur, in a place you’ll want to come back to.

An Experience Like No Other

Pull into the parking lot on Office Plaza Drive on a weekday evening and you’ll likely smell it before you see it. There’s something different about what comes off this truck — something deeper, more alive than the standard food truck fare. That’s because almost nothing here arrives pre-made or pre-ground. Chef Shankar roasts his whole spices himself, then grinds them fresh daily. Every masala, every spice blend, every condiment is made from scratch, in-house, that morning.

The menu is built to welcome everyone — first-timers and serious South Indian food lovers alike. For the uninitiated, Shankar recommends starting with the dosa. The batter is made from rice and lentils soaked for six full hours, ground smooth, and cooked to a thin, golden crisp — not sweet, but deeply savory, carrying the kind of flavor that only centuries of tradition can produce. It comes with a homemade karam, a chutney-based spice paste prepared fresh each day, that gives the dish its unmistakable Guntur character. “We have been having the dosa for more than 1,000 years back in India,” Shankar says with quiet pride. “And still, it’s the best.”

Then there’s the mirchi bajji — stuffed peppers that Shankar fries not once but twice, a technique entirely his own. Customers who order it for the first time tend to pause mid-bite. It’s the kind of dish that makes you set everything down just to think about what just happened. They come back for it. They keep coming back.

For those easing into South Indian flavors, the biryani — a fragrant spiced rice dish available with chicken, goat, shrimp, or vegetarian options — is a natural entry point. Butter chicken and paneer dishes are being added to the menu as accessible options for newcomers, but make no mistake: this is not a softened version of the cuisine. The spicy dishes are genuinely, authentically spicy. The mild dishes are genuinely mild. Shankar calibrates both with the same care and refuses to compromise either.

And every single order — every one — goes out the window with a small complimentary box of freshly made sweet. He makes it himself, every day, without exception. It’s not a garnish. It’s a signature.

“Whatever food I’m doing is fresh every day. I prepare fresh. Once I have anything left over, I’ll throw it.— Chef Shankar, The Guntur Talkies

The Man Behind the Truck

For now, The Guntur Talkies is a one-person operation, and that one person is doing the work of a full kitchen crew. Chef Shankar handles everything — the sourcing, the prep, the cooking, the service — drawing on twenty years of professional experience and an almost obsessive commitment to quality. “I open like 21 restaurants for other people,” he says. “I stay there as head chef and worked all these years. Now I opened myself.” The weight of that sentence is not lost on the people eating his food.

In the evenings, music plays outside the truck. Customers linger. Some of them dance. “The food is good, people liking it so they come in the evening. I have music outside. They walk, they’re dancing. It’s a beautiful spot, actually.” That’s not an accident — it’s a vision. A parking lot transformed into a gathering place.

Rooted in Every Community

One of the most remarkable things about The Guntur Talkies is who shows up. The clientele is genuinely mixed — South Asian regulars, office workers from surrounding buildings, curious newcomers, and families who drive across town because someone told someone who told someone else. Shankar’s catering menu reflects that same breadth: he doesn’t just cook Andhra Pradesh cuisine but Gujarati, Bengali, Tamil, Nawabi, Maharashtrian, Marathi, and more. Whatever community is celebrating, whatever festival is being honored, he can cook for it.

Word spread here the old-fashioned way, one person at a time. No paid promotion. No launch event. Just good food and genuine hospitality, repeated daily until the regulars became loyalists and the loyalists started dragging their friends along. “Started with one people,” he says simply. “It’s more publicity, one by one.”

What Comes Next

Chef Shankar is not standing still. He’s planning a cloud kitchen — a small, delivery-focused operation within a five-mile radius of the truck — so that people who can’t make it to the Motel 6 lot can still get the food brought to them. Lunch specials are launching imminently, with boxed meals aimed at the office community in the surrounding buildings. A fully operational website for direct ordering is nearly live. He’s preparing to hire staff, planning outreach to nearby businesses, and intends to take the truck to festivals and large events starting next year. The foundation is solid. The next chapter is about reach.

Four months in, The Guntur Talkies is still a new story. But the people who have already found it act like they’ve known about it for years. They come back. They bring people. They tell him not to leave.

Chef Shankar spent the better part of two decades building restaurants for other people, learning every inch of this industry from the inside out. Now that he’s built one for himself, it feels less like a business launch and more like an arrival. Everything before was preparation.

“I open like 21 restaurants for other people,” he says, with the quiet satisfaction of a man who no longer needs to finish the sentence. “Now I opened myself.”