Amrita's Sharad Thaali and some #Foodle Inspiration

A Foodle after a long, long time!

Inspiration to create can come from anywhere…  and also catch one TOTALLY by surprise... A beautiful meal I recently ate, got me inspired to #Foodle again. And I thought that something this momentous deserved a blogpost too, so… here we are!

I have a lot happening in my life, and off late, I've made some big decisions, had some sad things bring me down. I took time out, used the pre-Diwali time to de-clutter; my home, my life, my emotional and creative mind-space and just rejuvenate. I'v actively sought out people, and things that make me feel happy. And it all seems to be bearing fruit already!

Last Sunday I finally made it (been wanting to go for ages) to my friend Amrita’s most recent pop-up. Themed on the Sharad Ritu or Indian Autumn this was a seven-course Ayurvedic lunch, using seasonal ingredients sourced from local markets and farmers and took place at the all new The Classroom by La Folie (which is pretty cool too BTW).

According to Amrita,"Everything can be Ayurveda if you apply the principles correctly, and make it something we can relate to." Ayurveda says that the Indian monsoons, leaves a lot of Pitta or heat in its wake. "The sun is directed on us and Pitta is high all around, in nature, and in us." To counter this, Ayurveda suggests Pitta balancing foods. "The premise is simple. All creations are made of 5 elements including humans. These elements vary in different people based on our own dosha and prakriti (nature). We can balance our doshas with diet. Sharad is when we need immunity building foods, it is the perfect time to incorporate and acclimatize to foods that will come into season in the winter."

In keeping with this philosophy, her Sharad menu she was  made up of grounding, cooling foods, using seasonal ingredients such as Kashmiri Apples, Sitaphal, Baalam (a large Indian Cucumber indigenous to parts of India), fresh Singhada (Water Chestnuts) supplemented by indigenous grains and wild greens and vegetables from the Sahyadris, supplied by Triple OOO, Vrindavan and Offerings Farms. The meal stared with a chatpatta Green Apple Panna. Then came six courses served up with stories by Amrita.

Vanvaas was the first course, and it was dessert! No I'm not kidding! "Ayurveda recommends dessert first, as it is the hardest to digest. This plate is inspired by Ramayana and the way Sita, Ram and Laxman ate during their legendary Vanvas (exile). Sita was sad and refused to eat but loved Sitafal which is also cooling so there is a Spiced Sitaphal Cake, and it is said that while she was captive, Indra sent her Payasam, so there is a Black Rice Payasam inspired by that and a smidgen of Chavanprash to represent the Sanjeevani Booti.” Whipped coconut cream, kand chips and crisp poha finished the plate. And I ate it all for once! Because it had all the good stuff. I was not terribly enamoured of the Chavanprash bit of it, but the rest of it, especially that Sitaphal cake was worth every footstep I counted later!

The next course was "Kand" inspired by root vegetables. "Earth colour foods and root vegetables make us feel grounded. Whole foods, especially roots and tubers offer maximum energy, in fact they have been survival foods in times of famine and drought throughout the world. Roots actually root us." I have to say that, that bowl of earthy, chewy Farra (a rice pasta from Chattisgarh) inspired gnocchi, made from Karanda (as the tribals of Sahyadris call air potatoes) topped with browned ghee and something tangy I couldn’t identify, was my absolute favourite course!

Then came Baalam a course meant to hydrate the system. "Baalam kakdi are giant cucumber that are in season now, there are two main types, one form Jhaaba and another from Sailana, they are soft and sweet (unlike regular cucumbers) and super hydrating. Ideal for people of pitta dosha but also fab for this season when pitta is high. With the diced cucumber there is beetroot and pumpkin and on the plate are also bitter Bhrahmi and sour Sorrel (Gongura) leaves with a dressing of coriander and buttermilk on the side." The light and refreshing salad was ideal as a precursor to our next course.

The Diwali Gujiya Course, in which Gujiya shells made of Khapli Gehu and jowar, were customised with fillings based on individual doshas of the diners and served with teekha and meetha chutneys. (We had each been asked to fill in a form that would determine our doshas earlier). Based on the same, those with a Vata dosha got a badam and paneer filling, those with a Pitta dosha, got a filling of pumpkin and greens. And those with Kapha dosha got a filling of greens and mushrooms! (Mine was the Pitta option, a crisp casing filled with a moist filling of pumpkin and greens that was so good that it did not need any of the accompanying chutney.)

Next came the Sharad Thaali. The main course made of seasonal produce, cooked into dishes Amrita remembered from her childhood. Fresh Singhada (water chestnuts) cooked into a dry subzi with bhuna masala, Pakoda Kadhi with wild Taakla bhaaji in the pakodas, Beet Raita, Charred Guava Cachumber, Chana Dal Pulao, Jowar Roti, Green Veggies Masala Puri and Sabudana Papad. I loved the beautiful colours and textures on my plate and the guava salad, kadhi and raita were so good I  asked for seconds of them all!

Rounding off the meal was Mukhwas, a signature offering from Amrita, a paan leaf topped with a delicate, subtle coconut water jelly, crunchy fennel seeds, dry rose petals and a drizzle of sweet Gulkand. Rolled up, it all came together into a perfect end to a beautiful meal.

And the meal was beautiful… nuanced, full of good ingredients, colours, textures and positive vibes. I could gush on about it but that would do it a disservice. The fact that I came away inspired enough to spend 4 days illustrating it, says it all! I’ve known Amrita for years, having followed her journey on lifekirecipe.com, through all her experiments with food, including the OMG Bacon Jam years, going vegetarian years and exploring Ayurveda years. Today as a certified Ayurveda practitioner, she seems to be in her element showcasing Ayurvedic principles for everyday use and her passion shows in the detailing she puts into her cooking workshops, pop-up meals and more. I think she might have found her calling… and I look forward to lots more learning and beautiful experiences curated by her (that hopefully inspire some more foodling too…)

Gyaan and LINKS

Follow Amrita on Instagram, 

For local farmers follow Offerings Farms , Vrindavan Farm

Connect with Triple OOO farms, call/connect on whassap at 9116666066 of follow on their Website  Instagram 

The Classroom by Lafolie is a state-of-the-art studio for interactive cooking learning and will soon launch Mumbai’s first Bean-to-Bar experience.

Follow The Classroom on Instagram.

A Jugalbandi of Chefs - Bomra's at O'Pedro Off season popup

Chef Bawmra Jap of Bomra's Goa
and Chef Hussain Shahzad of O'Pedro, Mumbai

On Thursday I attended a media preview of the 'Bomra's at O Pedro' pop-up. I am told this is the first of many (I hope) delicious ‘Off Season’ collaborations O’Pedro is looking at hosting. (Goan eateries typically shut down in the monsoons and O Pedro plans to take advantage by having them pop up in Mumbai). In this first one, Chef Bawmra Jap brings the magic of popular Bomra’s to Mumbai. When I first heard of it, I was excited to go try Bomra's food. They were on my list after winning in the CNT awards last year. On arriving and settling down however, I discovered, that the menu on offer was not classic Bomra’s but more a jugalbandi between Chef Bawmra and Chef Hussain. Bawmra’s strength is his fundamental grip on Burmese/Asian flavours and Hussain’s his knowledge of Goan/Portuguese cuisine. I love discovering classic cuisines and flavours, but I also find menus like this, where talented food minds get creative, extremely exciting!

Against a background of O Pedro’s happy vibe and the company of some of Mumbai's most interesting food writers, Primrose Monteiro D’souza, Pallavi Mehra and Nivedita Jayaram Pawar along with Chef Hussain and Bawmra made for a memorable meal full of great food and riveting conversation at our table!

Here is what I ate (mostly) and drank (sparingly from others since I don’t have sugar) from a menu of small and large plates.

Rahul, the mixologist kindly made me a no-sugar version of Bomra’s Gin Fizz (gin, triple sec, kaffir lime and Ginger Tincture, egg white and tonic water). I also tasted the other cocktails thanks to my generous dining companions. There was also a lovely Candolim Punch (rum, sesame milk, jaggery, cinnamon and lime) that came with a bowl of fruit. The idea being to eat little mango and coconut then chase it with the punch. The cocktails were nuanced and thankfully not overly sweet. There’s also a Kokum Gose beer on offer for the beer lovers.

Scampi Ceviche by the
 "Ceviche Chef" Hussain

The meal started with a selection of small plates. Happily, for me, the first one was a Scampi Ceviche. I love any of the dishes that belong to the raw cured meat /seafood dishes family, ceviche, tartare, poke, crudo, carpaccio. And (as I told him) I crowned of Chef Hussain, with the ‘khitab’ of Ceviche Chef long ago because he’s showcased so many stellar versions of ceviche throughout various menu changes at O Pedro. The Scampi ‘Ceviche’ had fresh scampi against a backdrop of yuzu ponzu sauce, topped with Burmese coriander, kaffir lime, and mango ginger. The zingy yuzu and highly aromatic, spicy herb combination added just the right liveliness to the dish without overwhelming the sweet soft textures of the scampi. One more leaf in the Hussain’s ‘Ceviche Chef’ in my opinion.

As the next dish came to the table, the conversation between the chefs veered towards eating exotic meats in Vietnam. Snake and crocodile are overrated, we were told, and turtle (although controversial) is delicious but both balked at the thought of consuming snake blood. I’ve eaten a lot of these exotic meats in my time, and I agree, but at that moment, I was to focus on the beautiful and far more plebeian rice paper rolls before me. Shiso, avocado and raw mango wrapped in rice paper, offered bright lively contrast to monsoon heavy skies outside. So subtly delicious on their own with the shiso adding a burst of flavour, they did not really need the killer Passion fruit hot sauce they came with. But the sauce was so good, we unanimously elected to hold on to it to keep dipping into throughout the meal.

Then subsequent dish almost dethroned Hussain as Ceviche king (the technicality that it was a tartare and the fact that he put it together on Bawmra’s direction made the difference.) To paint a picture with broad strokes Tartare are the meat versions of seafood-based Ceviche. Usually containing raw meat finely minced or ground served with assorted seasonings depending on the flavour profile of the meal. The Tartare we were served was literally put together on a whim that morning, so it is not on the menu. B*** was minced with Burmese herbs and plated with smoked marrow on top. It was served with little crackers (of Sago I think) on the side. It will tell you how good it was that while everyone tasted and talked around me, I proceeded to polish off every bite of this dish at our table with quiet concentration. Some things, you might never get again in life, after all!

Bawmras Jugalbandi Tartare
as executed by Hussain. 

"I just talk, and he puts it together," laughed Bawmra as he spooned some onto my plate. Hussain agrees. "It's like he is here on holiday, having fun randomly throwing ideas at me and leaving me to figure it out!" But beyond the happy banter, are threads of strong mutual respect and intrinsic understanding of the other’s ideas.

 

Like the Tartare, many dishes on the menu are a result of the unique synergy of food language between these two chefs. Add the catalyst of trips to Vietnam, much hanging out in Goa over drinks, games of SallyBally (water volleyball), impromptu midnight beef stew, liberally seasoned with herbs and flavourings Hussain has flagrantly stolen from Bawmra’s kitchen garden in Goa and we have an indescribable, irresistible mix of food and fun! As we continued to find out.

Smoked Corn Gnocchi

Next came a Smoked Corn Gnocchi on a bed of banana flower ragu and black sesame puree. The ‘Gnocchi’ is inspired by a Burmese dish called Mont Let Po, or ‘snack balls’ found all over the country. The Banana flower ragu and Black sesame puree are Hussain’s addition. The combination was quite lovely, the gnocchi chewy, the ragu rich in texture and subtle sweetness, the sesame puree lending earthy nuttiness. But this and a tofu curry that came later, were the quietest (though no less flavourful) dishes on a menu that in my opinion, was full of far more flamboyantly flavoured dishes.

Char Grilled Quail in Cherry Teriyaki

Char-Grilled Quail Skewers followed. Small barbeque ‘grills’ assembled out of terracotta flower-pots topped with wire frames bearing what looked like doll sized chicken legs (quail look like miniature chicken legs). Quail is ridiculously easy to overcook to dry nothingness, so I was happy to see these had been handled deftly. Brushed with a cherry teriyaki sauce and cooked to smokey perfection they are quickly wiped out by us. (I shamelessly used my high protein diet to snag a couple of extra pieces here!)

Tofu Curry with Pelata (in the background)

The large plates began with Tofu Curry with roasted pumpkin and lotus root chips and Burmese Palatha (Kerala Parotta’s Burmese doppelganger). 

Spicy Rice Noodles
with Shan Tofu Sauce 

Then came delicious Spicy Rice Noodles with Shan tofu Sauce. The noodles tossed with crisp sautéed snow peas, broccoli and crushed peanuts were fantastic, spicy and perfectly balances. That said I found the Shan tofu sauce was redundant. In Burmese cuisine Shan tofu is chickpea flour tofu. And Shan Tofu sauce is chickpea flour sauce. But for a palate that has tasted the more complex flavours of Gatta and Kadhi, the first is a bland version of Gatta, and the second looks and tastes like a bland Kadhi.

The two large plates that blew me away were the Steamed Fish and B*** Curry

I have fond memories from the first time I ate steamed fish years ago, so this option of Steamed Fish in banana leaves with a mixture of Asian herbs with Burmese Junglee Sauce had me excited. I LOVED every bite, the fish was juicy and flaky topped with a combination of herbs, Burmese coriander (that has a flavour of betel leaves) shiso, green chillies, coriander and more was fantastic. But be warned, this one is spicy, even without the fiery jungle sauce and even for a chilli head like me! I had to quench the fire with generous sips of Tom Yum Iced tea (house made Thai spice infused vodka, rum, gin, triple sec, jaggery, lime).

Candolim Midnight B*** stew

Thankfully the Candolim Midnight B**f Stew, also helped settle the burn. It came accompanied with the rider, “availability determines ingredients, number of cocktails consumed determines the flavour...” and it is over bowlfuls of this same stew that much of this menu was cooked up between Bawmra and Hussain. We got a version that included a large marrow bone requiring the rich marrow be scooped out into the curry. Falling-off-the-bone tender meat, tender chunks of melt-in-mouth marrow and a beautiful silky gravy accompanied by a subtly flavoured Coconut & Edamame rice made a supremely satisfying end to the meal for me! 

While I did take a bite of the Lemongrass Crème Brulee, with spiced biscotti and candied ginger that was dessert, it did not ring any high notes for me after that meal.

Coconut Edamame rice with Candolim B*** Stew

Like any great musical jugalbandi, this meal was a fantastic melding of two great chef's cooking philosophies (and quirks!) that came together in a gloriously flamboyant whole of flavours and textures. One of those experiences that one is fortunate to get a taste of but cannot be replicated again. So go get your fix before the festival ends! 

The Bomra’s at O’Pedro menu is available 27 July - 14 Augus 2019. Most of the above dishes will be available on 27/28 July, and a selection will be available post that until 14 Aug. All on a-la-carte basis (starters from Rs 425, mains from Rs 550, cocktails from Rs 550). At O’Pedro, BKC, Mumbai.

With Chef Hussain and Chef Bawmra outside O'Pedro

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Bawibride, Gitika's Pakghor and Poppaddum - Meet my Culinary Heroes

Gitika Saikia.

Imagine how refreshing it would be to experience meals that are different. Lighter on the stomach, seasonal, seasoned with stories and experiences; Like a Parsi Bhonu, washed down with stories of eccentric Bawas, beer and Raspberry at a period bungalow in a vintage Parsi Baug where time stops. Or a festive Assamese Bihu meal accompanied by dancing, anecdotes about looking for ant eggs cooking silk worms and learning about unknown North Eastern Cultures and Cuisines. Or a traditional Kerela Sadya served on a leaf, garnished with stories of coconut harvests and pepper picking…. Sounds like something you want to do? Well read on to find out how!

Until last year, the dining scene in Mumbai was pretty dismal. New restaurant openings, menu launches or food festival were daily occurrences. One hotel finished a Kashmiri festival and another announced theirs a week later. An element of ennui had set in. Nothing new was happening. They also caricature the cuisine in focus with the broadest brush, to appeal to the largest common denominator, dishing up predictable unimaginatively-executed menus. (Exceptions are ITC and Leela, where Indian food experiences are well researched and respectfully served).

Regional food festivals at hotels also for some reason, tend to be about royal cuisines… like they need to justify charging what they do by tagging it with ‘royal.’ Until now, home cooking has been largely ignored only seeing light in the recipe pages of columns like 'Ghar ka khana around festive times when papers are looking for something topical to feature. Or on the rare occasions that a hotel chain deigns to exploit a home-cook and showcase a cuisine their chefs cannot do (yes that is a grouse I will air at some point as well). So it is a happy thing, then, that into this desolate landscape of dining have arrived a tribe of extraordinary culinary evangelists. There is a burgeoning underground food scene that is mushrooming in our melting pot of a city and it is so exciting! Over the last few weeks I finally had a chance to catch up with some amazing women who are changing the dynamics of Mumbai’s culinary scene.

Perzen Patel

First I visited Perzen, who has been charming my twitter timeline with her indefatigable enthusiasm in promoting Parsi cuisine. I was invited to a Dhansak lunch at her new kitchen, in a vintage parsi bungalow. Perzen learned Parsi cooking from her mother to connect with her roots. Realizing that Parsi food was disappearing she decided to do something about it. The result? The Bawi Bride kitchen. She started taking orders for Parsi food, conducting personalised cooking classes among other things. But her most delicious offering is the Parsi meals she hosts. 

Jer Villa

Which climbed a few notches higher since she began offering them at her new home, Jer Villa a retro Parsi bungalow, in Malcolm Baug, Jogeshwari.  I got there on a humid Sunday afternoon to be welcomed by a smiling Perzen and a tall glass of chilled Raspberry. Much talk, eating of Saria (sago crackers) and sighing over Jer Villa’s antiquities (like a fan in the loo!) later we dug into lunch. A delicious meal of Dhansak, Salli chicken and Lagan nu Custard washed down with chilled beer. The Dhansak was perfect, but it was the Salli chicken that I really savoured that day. Tender chicken in a spicy, subtly sweet gravy with crispy salli to sprinkle over. I just could not get enough! Perzen has something happening almost every weekend so check out her website and sign up for one of her meals. For more info check – www.bawibride.com 

Next on the menu was an Assamese Bihu meal, right here at my studio. 

Assamese Bihu meal 

In Assam, April is when young village boys go hunting for a delicacy found only on mango and olive trees. Red ant eggs, costly to buy, they make for a special delicacy during Bihu, the Assamese New Year. Gitika Saikia timed herself perfectly and flew in from Assam bearing these and bags full of exotic ingredients we had never seen before like silkworm eggs and proceeded to cook up a fantastic meal of ant eggs scrambled with egg. There was also polu lota, made from the cocoon of the silkworm, boiled and stir fried, and washed down with a fermented rice drink flavoured with 80 different herbs. Gitika has singlehandedly given the cuisines of the North East and identity in India. She regularly hosts meals of different kinds all over the city. Find out more about what she does here http://gitika.me 

Sneha Niar

Soon after this I finally met Sneha Nair, an economist who started cooking to reconnect herself with Keralite food but soon found it became a full time job under the name Poppadum! Sneha invited me over and spoilt me rotten with a fantastic meal to give me a taste of her cooking. There was a subtly sweet Pineapple Pachadi spiked with mustard, Syrian Christian veg stew redolent of cinnamon, mutton pepper fry, pomfret pepper fry, raw mango mustard chutney, mango ginger chutney, yoghurt and Madras Cucumber Curry, Poppaddum and pickled mango ginger. And there was Sneha of the dancing eyes who fascinated me with her memories and stories. 

A Poppaddum Meal

                                                                        Every weekend Sneha serves up sadyas (traditional and often festive Keralite meals involving a selection of dishes served on a banana leaf) inspired by traditional Syrian, Malabar Muslim, and Kerela Hindu cuisines. The theme and menu varies with each lunch which – like all of Poppaddum’s lunches - are served in the informal setting of Nair’s home on banana leaves. For more information go to https://www.facebook.com/poppaddum

Perzen Patel 

                                                                            It’s one thing to cook a meal occasionally for friends it is absolutely another to do it on a weekly or often even daily basis. For me it is a great measure of regard and affection when someone cooks me a meal with love. They spend the most valuable commodity on us. Time. These three ladies, have taken the onus of evangelizing their heritage and culture through the medium of their food. They do what it takes, from going to any lengths to get the ingredients they need, to refusing to compromise on anything that is part of the experience they serve up.  They are up there - my culinary heroes.

I’d predicted that Indian food would be huge on the menu in 2015, when I was working on the Natures Basket Food Trends report for 2015,last year. With Indian food being discovered and rediscovered at every level in our country on a daily basis, today, I’m happy to be proven right. 

One of the areas that this is most evident in, is that of home cooks and home cooking experiences in Mumbai. In addition to contacting these ladies directly, keep an eye on the events curated by the following, Trekurious Mumbai (they have each of these ladies featuring in May), Secret Ingredient home chef experiences and Bombay Local food festivals from Small Fry Co. (They have the biggest ever Bombay Local edition on 16^th May) and of course the Culinary Legacy events I curate at APB Cook Studio (Rongali Bihu version 2 on 16^th May & a fabulous Maharashtrian Mejwani Food Festival coming up on 23 May. .

Culinary Legacy event at APB Cook Studio

Meal Sneha cooked for me

Jer Villa and a band of happy foodies! 

Mumbai on the platter

A few days ago a small corner of a leading daily quietly reported the closing of China White, (to reopen as Royal China) a restaurant that opened to amazing press coverage a mere 8 months ago. Two pages down in the same paper three stalwarts of the Mumbai dining scene were seen celebrating great innings with their establishments; Gaylords turned 50, Trattoria at the president turned 25 and relative baby Olive turned 6. This is the ever changing foodscape of Mumbai. For a foodie, Mumbai is the proverbial oyster - nowhere in India is dining more rewarding than here!

With India opening up to foreign trade, Mumbaikars have more money, less free time and a greater exposure to foreign influences. This has had immense impact on what they eat and the way they eat. And restaurants, exotic sections at supermarkets, food sections in dailies and publications, books on food and cooking, food on the TV, Radio and internet, the advent of swish cooking classes and food travel are all registering activity. India [is] shining on the gastronomic scene and nowhere is this fact more obvious than in Mumbai.

The world on Mumbai’s Menu
“276 restaurants, 81 confectioners and chocolatiers, plus a guide to secret ingredients” exclaims the 1997 edition of the Good food guide to Mumbai written by Rashmi Uday Singh. In the eighties, eating out was reserved for special occasions and meant picking from Mughlai and Punjabi for Indian food, continental and Italian in terms of world cuisine and of course the obsequious “Chinese” we love with a vengeance. That was before Rahul Akerkar’s Indigo and A. D. Singh’s Olive, followed by the success of Basillico and Moshe’s. That is when the dining sector of Mumbai opened up to the stand alone restaurant. Today eating out is the in thing in Mumbai, it offers entertainment and there is a smorgasbord of offerings to pick from.

Mumbaikars love their food, are open to trying everything and have the pick of the proverbial candy box to choose from. Restaurants of every ilk, offer a plethora of dining options with both regional cuisines – Punjabi, Peshawari, Gujarati, Bengali, Malwani, Goan, Maharashtrian, South Indian and a lot in between – as well as world cuisine – Tibetan, Chinese, Korean, Moroccan, Malaysian, Indonesian, Italian, Lebanese, Burmese and Mongolian are on the menu.

Deap Ubhi the mastermind behind “Burrp!, Inc” sums things up, “I’m originally from San Francisco, which I believe has the best dining scene in the world, and after settling down in Mumbai, I must admit I was pleasantly surprised. What makes Mumbai special is the variance, not only in cuisines, but also in food types, ambiance, etc. On any given night, I can go to Shiro in Worli for some awesome sushi, grab some drinks with friends at Geoffrey’s in town and then head to Juhu at 3AM after partying and have some of the best egg bhurji on the planet from a popular roadside stall. It’s just great.” No wonder then, that, 5 editions down the line the 2005 issue of the good food guide collated upwards of 1000 restaurant reviews!

Taking a moment from putting together the latest good food guide, Rashmi Uday Singh conveys palpable excitement across the phone line. “I have mapped the gastronomic scene of Mumbai for the last 24 years, but it is in the last 3-4 years that it has been at its most exciting and off late it is downright thrilling!... I mean, imagine this, yesterday I reviewed a South American Burger joint (Bembos) and just before that I checked out a stand alone Japanese restaurant (Tetsuma) and it is not just the restaurants, look into my 2005 food guide and the food shops section will amaze you. The new one is looking even better, I have even found a caterer that does Sushi!”
40 % of the 2005 guide reviewed, Food shops, Tiffin and food service providers and home entrepreneurs and there was a whole book dedicated to nightlife. Once a cuisine appeals at a restaurant, the natural one wants to try cooking it at home. I remember a time when Chinese – albeit Indian - food was made with metallic tasting canned mushrooms and baby corn usually sourced from Crawford market in sauces cooked up at home. Today these delicious fungi and bonsai corn cobs can be found at the corner subziwalla jostling for space alongside a host of quaintly categorised as “English vegetables” and everything from Soy sauce to chilli oil is available at local supermarkets or even at the savvier corner Kirana stores. Nostalgia and wonder aside, this quite neatly illustrates Mumbai’s dining graph.

There are three stages in a Cuisines amalgamation onto Mumbai’s menus. The first introductory stage in which a rash of restaurants will mushroom all over the city - Japanese cuisine is at this nascent stage in Mumbai currently. The second is the retail stage when supermarkets begin to stock imported ingredients related to a cuisine - Italian, Thai and Mexican have progressed to this stage now; Olive Oil, Risotto, Curry pastes are all available locally as was evidenced at the recent Uppercrust Food and wine show which was populated with numerous importers of ingredients from all over the world. The third stage is that of integration – the final frontier in which the demand for a product is high enough for the local corner store to allocate space for it in the constraints of the small space it has. This is where the “Chinese” we are addicted to is comfortably nestled.

Food for the mind
The first cookbook I ever owned was Cooking at Felicity house by Roahld Dahl. I loved it for the interesting stories accompanying each recipe. I cannot say I have ever cooked from that book, but it is still a valued part of a cookbook collection that is upwards of 500 strong today. Of these about 40% are Indian and about 5 % are ones that I keep going back to. The two books I love the most are both self published tomes rich with information and sound guidance. Although cookbooks and books on food have registered a tremendous surge over the last few years, the market is still at a nascent stage. Tarla Dalal, Sanjeev Kapoor, Nita Mehta, Karen Anand and Jiggs Kalra are all household names but books below the Rs.200 mark are still a preferred choice, perhaps because our cookbooks have yet to go beyond being mere collations of recipes.

While Books are showing a surge of some kind publications are not. The sign of a trend coming into being is the increasing amounts of real estate it acquires in publications. One would think that with gastronomy becoming so popular, the print media would be overflowing with interesting articles on food. Not so. “There hasn’t been a noteworthy growth in food writing” observes Lewis “Although there are just more publications as compared to a decade ago, there hasn’t been a very dramatic shift in the way each handles food, the subject still has limited attention” he concludes. There has been a huge increase in the number of publications launching in India in the last year but few seem to focus on food. Scan the dailies and you will see none go beyond reporting food events, giving recipes and reviewing restaurants – although I must say Jharna Thakkar of HT manages to make these interesting to read too.

Antoine Lewis erstwhile food writer and editor of Savvy cookbook, recalls “the first publication to include a full food page was the Sunday Observer. C Y Gopinath did a delightful column with Saturday times although he was not a food writer, Sharada Dwivedi the historian also wrote on food with Shalini Devi Holkar the cookbook author although those were occasional articles that explored community cooking, Shatbi Basu did a column for the Sunday Midday and Anil Dharkar did restaurant reviews for the Saturday Times but they were all occasional writers on food not dedicated to the subject”

Interestingly it is Lewis’s magazine Savvy Cookbook that has survived as the oldest dedicated food publication in India, outliving predecessors such as Cuisine, Foodtalk and Food magazine. Two other magazines that devote a large part of their editorial are Tarla Dalal’s Cooking and More which seems to be more of a publicity driven publication and the pricey Uppercrust magazine whose visual coverage of food is stunning and extensive but falls short on the writing front.

Some publications do realise the importance of a food section. Timeout, Mumbai a fortnightly publication of Mumbai carries one of the meatiest food sections in the city and is a font for information on food. Naresh Fernandes, editor of Timeout Mumbai emphasises “The food section is extremely important for Time Out Mumbai and is among our most popular sections. It not only tells readers what's new about the city's dining scene but also tries to interpret what our changing food habits mean in the context of the city's larger social and economic transformation. We're committed to writing about street food and food histories as well as the higher-end restaurant scene. After all, we believe that we are what we eat!”

While the foodscape of Mumbai is growing in leaps and bounds, the food writing scene is yet to take off but one is happy to let it take it’s time as long as one has two erudite columns; that of Vir Sanghvi in the Hindustan Times Sunday magazine “Brunch” – although that can drag on rare occasions and the Sunday ET one by Vikram doctor Sunday to Sunday!

Bridging the food divide
An interesting off shoot of the restaurant boom has been the restaurant PR agency. With the growing amount of publications in the city waking up to food, some one has to bridge the gap between food producers and their consumers. It is diligent PR people retained by restaurants that ensure the “events” section of publications teem with happenings. Aseem Dixit of Wraps and Rolls had an extremely viable product but “Noting that business depended solely on word of mouth publicity I decided to retain the services of a PR agent. This turned out to be a great move since it brought us instant awareness and we have grown in leaps and bounds in a relatively short spam of time.” This is not two say that a PR agency can create wonders, restaurants today launch in a blaze of publicity but Mumbaikars do not suffer fools gladly so if the product is bad, it will fizzle out. Hence is the immense turnover in restaurants

Like publications, Indian TV too is lagging behind on food reporting. Content offered currently is a khichdi of reruns of shows from other parts of the world, cooking shows like Khana Khazana and restaurant reviews. In this mire I happened to catch an episode of the “the Foodie” on Times now in which intrepid foodie host Kunal Vjayakar was traipsing about in Karnataka in a lungi and purple shirt doing a Rajnikant with a pair of goggles. What is refreshing about this food show is that it does not subscribe to the age old format of beautifully decorated kitchen with chef demonstrating dishes. Kunal brings a refreshing angle of curiosity and fun to food. No wonder, after all it was his statement “I wake up and wonder, what am I going to have for breakfast, then lunch and dinner” inspired Preeti Prasad EP of the show to conceptualise a show around him that would truly celebrate food “The Foodie celebrates the art of Gluttony” she says with pride.

The Virtual Byte
Once, locating a recipe for a dish or the description of an ingredient might have meant leafing through the pages of the nearest cookbook but not anymore. The World Wide Web has become a one stop shop for any information required on gastronomy. Discover the cuisine of Mumbai through the Indian food forum of www.egullet.org, the food forums of Another Subcontinent. (www.anothersubcontinent.com) and (www.gourmetindia.com) where the serious Gourmets of India congregate. The latest website to launch is “Burrp!” which was inspired by a problem – the absolutely lack of online resources for users to not only find, but also share their experiences about local businesses. Says Deap Ubhi its creator, “From a business perspective, choosing the internet as a platform is obviously much less capital intensive. It just makes business sense. It is much easier and much more efficient to enable a community online. Had this been a publication, we could not engage in a two-way relationship with our users, i.e. provide information and expect user reviews. Magazines are severely limited in this manner in that all they can do is push information. Our Mumbai portal, went live on August 15th of this year. Response has been fantastic, as our online traffic has grown at very aggressive clips over the past few months. Also, as the product gets deeper in terms of features, i.e. e-ticketing for movies and local events, we also expect to see volume from that as well.

If you do not find what you are looking for on websites or discussion forums, you’ll probably find it on one of the millions of foodblogs out there. Foodblogs resulted when Foodies discovered blogs (Short for weblogs) or online journals. There are a select few blogging on food in Mumbai, Gaurav is eating his way through the restaurants of Mumbai on his blog Bombay Dining (http://eatingoutinbombay.blogspot.com), while Anthony of Anthony’s Kitchen (http://anthonyskitchen.blogspot.com), the self Proclaimed Maharajah of Bachelor Cooking and has made it his mission to enlighten those people – students, bachelors away from home and newlyweds - that subsist on takeaway and Maggi that it is easy to cook some very delicious yet simple food at home. and Pune based Vikram Karve is talking about his favourite food and where he eats it on the Food Blog of Vikram Karve (http://foodiekarve.sulekha.com/), I found his post in early April on his favourite foodwalks in Mumbai and Pune very enlightening.

Another aspect that is registering activity is that of food travel. While India is the flavour of the moment around the world and attracts a lot of Gastronomic tourist, Indians who are born gastronome’s are yet to really discover food travel. India’s number one holiday brand, Club Mahindra recently added a new product to the repertoire “Gourmet Holidays” which give members of Club Mahindra an opportunity to sample the world's finest cuisines and step inside different cultures. Recognising that of life’s greatest pleasures come from wonderful food shared with family they recently conducted the first Gourmet holiday at Coorg.
The Coorg Gourmet holiday was an experience in indulging in the gastronomic delicacies one’s palate desires! The holiday offered a variety of exotic cuisines and wholesome food experiences for two nights and three days. The cuisines that were offered include, Gujarati and Rajasthani, South Indian, Greek and Continental. There were also insightful workshops on olive oil, chocolates and salads along with unique regional entertainment programs. We plan to offer such experiences to members at our other resorts too.

2007 will see Japanese Cuisine strengthen and grow in popularity, perhaps even enter the home kitchen. The advent of Bembos might indicate an awakening to South American cuisine. Regional Indian micro-cuisines will continue to gain popularity. Overall Health and wellness will become more important. Eating organic is already gaining momentum although certification is still a question mark but sustainable farming and fair trade practices will take a while to be recognised however, the retail revolution will have to play itself out first. The foodscape of Mumbai is set to soar in 2007, get ready to savour the experience.
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