Chennai :Tales behind taste

Akila Kannadasan  TH : January 10, 2014 18:21 IST  

What is the one thing that is constant in the streets of Chennai? 

Well, food. Akila Kannadasan probes a little and finds that many of our street-food options come with interesting stories. 

Here are some…

Noor serves Atho at George Town. Photo: Akila Kannadasan

Atho

Mohammed Ibrahim’s customers do not like to talk. Not when they are eating off ceramic plates piled high with an orange mass — the famous Burmese atho of Second Line Beach Road, George Town. This concoction of cabbage, noodles, and onions, has been attracting people from the city for over three decades.

We watch as Ibrahim’s son Noor mixes the ingredients in a huge silver basin. As he stands on a raised wooden platform surrounded by masalas and vegetables, he looks like a magician performing a trick. Noor sprinkles a little bit of this and a little bit of that, mixes the mass, scoops it on to a plate, and hands it over to the hungry customer.

“I was born in 1962 at the gymkhana hospital in Burma. My father drove boats for a living,” recalls Mohammed. After he came to India in 1969, Mohammed’s mother taught him to make the Burmese delicacy. It has been 32 years since he set up shop.

So, what’s in the atho? The dish consists of noodles, shredded cabbage, onions, coriander leaves, split channa flour, chilli powder, oil, tamarind and lime juice, which are mixed by hand and served with a sprinkling of fried onions and garlic. There are around seven atho shops in the area. These also serve masala eggs (slit boiled eggs stuffed with a chilli-based masala) and atho fry (atho simmered on a tawa with scrambled eggs). Though Mohammed’s customers are predominantly men, he also gets families who stop by for take-away. But the best way to enjoy atho is to eat it on the street, taking in the flavours as vehicles trundle past.

Sweet bondas at a tea kadai in T. Nagar. Photo: Akila Kannadasan

Sweet bondas

Tea kadais are little wonders that serve the best quick snacks. These shops have character — the streets of Chennai are full of them. The piping hot tea, served in thick glass tumblers, is sweet and thick. Every tea shop serves samosas and masala vadais, but it’s the sweet bonda that won my heart. Golden brown with a smooth exterior, it is round and a little bigger than an egg. One bonda costs Rs. 5.

It’s soft, with a tinge of sugar, and does not drip oil, despite being deep-fried. Wash it down with tea and you are pepped enough to fly. The bondas are cooked in masses, alongside other tea shop snacks in units in Vannarapettai. Salesmen pick them up much before dawn and deliver them at tea shops in the city.

Vettri is among them. A native of Tiruvenveli, his day begins at 4 a.m. He cycles to Vannarapettai from Adyar and delivers samosas and bondas to the tea kadais in T. Nagar and Pondy Bazaar — his day ends at 3 p.m. “The bonda is made of maida and sugar. Yeast is added and the mix is set aside for five hours and is then deep fried,” he informs. Vetri is always racing against time when on duty. He flatly refuses to be photographed. “I can’t slow down. I have to keep moving…” he says as he pedals away.

Keerai vadais at Bommai chathiram. Photo: Akila Kannadasan

Keerai vadai

Its 3 p.m. and the residents of Peialwar Veedhi, a narrow street abutting the Triplicane Parthasarathy temple, are having their afternoon snooze. But work has just begun at the bommai chathiram. Amulu stands alone in the chathiram’s dining hall, making keerai vadais. Kolu dolls peep out from the loft as she mixes the urad batter, greens, and coconut slices. “This place belonged to my grandmother Navaneethammal. It was built in 1960 — there was a time when it was a famous wedding hall. During the Navaratri season, we sell dolls here; this is how the place came to be known as bommai chathiram.”

Amulu’s keerai vadais are well-known in the area. She serves it with a generous helping of sambar and chutney. She makes around 30 every evening, which get sold off as soon as she opens her hotel on the ground floor. Amulu also makes bondas and puris for dinner — but it’s the vadais that are sought-after. The best thing about the keerai vadai experience is the feeling that you are eating at a place where hundreds of weddings took place once upon a time.

Zahir Hussain sells seempal at T.Nagar. Photo: Akila Kannadasan

Seempal

It looks like a piece of the moon. Zahir Hussain slices a bit of it and hands it over, egging me to try it. It’s soft, moist, and mildly sweet — for a moment, I forget that I am on the bustling Usman Road. It’s a taste that brings to the mind green fields and grandmother’s food. Who would’ve thought that steamed seempal (cow’s first milk) was sold in T. Nagar? Zahir sells a slice for Rs.10.

A family in Minjur which has connections with farms at Madhavaram and Gummudipoondi, has been making the delicacy for several years. Salesmen such as Zahir pay around Rs.1, 500 for a five kg cake of steamed seempal and sell it at crowded locations in the city and during temple festivals. “Elaichi, white sugar, or palm sugar is added to the milk which is steamed similar to idli,” explains Zahir. He adds that the exact method of preparation, however, is a closely-guarded secret.

Kvuni arisi puttu. Photo: Akila Kannadasan

Kavuni arisi puttu

Traditionally, kavuni arisi or black rice is served for a girl as soon as she attains puberty. Known to be extremely nutritious, a puttu made with the rice is available for just Rs. 10 in the city. Ibrahim makes it at home every morning and sells it at market places with a sprinkling of grated coconut and sugar. The deep red puttu with a dash of white is absolutely delicious. You can find Ibrahim on Usman Road and Ranganathan Street from 1.30 p.m. to 10 p.m.

BANGALORE :Healthy food at your doorstep

HEALTH IS WEALTH: Can’t cook your meal? There’s good food available at i-Tiffin.

Bhumika k TH January 3, 2014 14:29 IST
 

Food i-Tiffin offers calorie-defined and balanced meals for the pan-Indian palate on your workplace or home

Who wouldn't like a hot lunch at work? Specially if it's a calorie-defined meal, cooked with olive oil and is fairly fat-free.

Throw in ingredients such as high-fibre chappatis, a salad, brown rice... And you would be happier that you're achieving the unimaginable — eating a healthy meal at work.

That’s the promise that i-Tiffin is making to Bangaloreans. And ‘I’ in their case, for a change in IT city, stands for ‘intelligent’. “We’re not a catering company. We are a nutrition company,” Deepa Prakash, product head at i-Tiffin, is quick to define and distinguish themselves.

“Our mission is to change the way India eats. We have a variety of food available in our country, but people tend to eat out of lack of knowledge. In nutrition science we can blend ingredients seamlessly into a complete meal,” says this nutritionist, who has an uncanny ability to sneak in healthy gourds into a potato sabji, and cabbage into daal.

She also holds a Ph.D in food behaviour from the University of Mysore and a PGD in quality assurance and food analysis, DFRL, University of Mysore.

“We initially thought we would be catering for a niche segment that is calorie-conscious. But our survey in Bangalore found there are many health conscious people who don’t know where to get healthy food,” says i-Tiffin CEO Tapan Kumar Das. Tapan, an IIMA grad, has earlier co-founded Qua Nutrition, a signature nutrition clinic. I-Tiffin offers what the body needs in terms of the right quantity, ingredients, process, storage, and hygiene, according to international food HACCP (hazard analysis and critical control points) standards, claims Tapan. The food is filled hot into EU grade trays, heat sealed, and sent for delivery in insulated containers, adds Deepa.

Their kitchen in Indiranagar has been dishing out lunch platters for the last three months to over 200 subscribers in the city. About 50 percent of these subscribers are bachelors or men whose families are in other cities, 20 per cent are senior citizens, and the remaining, are couples where both partners work and are unable to get a meal going in the morning, says Tapan.

Right now they offer only vegetarian meals, but by January 2014 they hope to start the non-vegetarian option too. Convenience and affordability is what they are aiming for, he says.

Each day’s meal is different, but the standard 550 calorie meal consists of three hi-fibre chappatis, a vegetable-based dal, a subji, a brown-rice based rice dish, and a salad. Bangalore being a cosmopolitan city, we've ensured the meal caters to a pan-Indian palate, says Tapan. "We've done serious R&D into what an average urban Indian needs to eat, based on many factors.

Most vegetarian Indians tend to eat less protein and more fat, and feel fatigued easily, and we intend to address that with a fulfilling meal that balances carbs, proteins, minerals, dietary fibre," says Deepa.

Their general wellness meal is designed so you feel light enough after eating to work, and avoid bingeing between the crucial evening hours.

Soon they hope to have specific food trays for diabetics, for those looking for heart healthy food, a children's food tray in tie-ups with schools, dinner trays, full-day meals, weight-watchers' tray, non-oily i-biriyani too. They are already in talks with companies to cater to entire offices.

A monthly subscription of vegetarian tray costs Rs. 1,750, with 20 trays delivered Monday to Friday. They do not deliver one-off meals .

 Each day’s menu is announced on their FB page. I-Tiffin can be contacted on 7353230000/ 9008600079.

How to make…Chole

Vanathi Madhavdas :TH: 10 Jan 2014

The quintessential North Indian sidedish

Chole is a traditional dish of Punjab usually served as an accompaniment with batura. I learnt this dish from a friend of mine.

What you need

Chickpea (Kabuli chana, white) - 250 gm

Coriander seeds - 2 tbsp

Cumin - 2 tsp

Cloves - 3 or 4

Cinnamon -1 inch piece

Ginger, pounded - a big piece

Red chilli powder - 1 tsp

Oil for cooking - 4 tbsp

Amchur powder or tamarind (size of a small marble) - optional

Salt to taste

Cooking instructions

Roast the cumin seeds till they turn colour slightly and then powder and keep aside.

Roast the coriander seeds till it gives off an aroma you get the smell of its flavour and then powder it along with cloves and cinnamon.

Soak the chickpeas overnight and pressure cook in water till it turns soft.

Heat the oil and then add the pound ginger and fry for 2 minutes till the raw smell disappears, on a low flame.

Add the boiled chickpeas channa and along with it add all the powders including red chilli powder and salt.

Add the water in which the chickpeas were channa was boiled and you may add a little extra water if more gravy is required.

Allow to boil for a while. nicely before you take it off the fire .

Turn off the flame and add the It can be served with chopped onions (optional) (for those who cannot do without onions) and lime.

Vanathi Madhavdas is a teacher who has a penchant for cooking North Indian dishes.

Chennai celebrates Pongal the rural way

A traditional 'Pongal Thotti' in a village in Chidambaram district.

Karthik Subramanian :The Hindu ; 10 Jan 2014

Residents soak in festivities at ancestral villages; some visit nearby districts for taste of tradition

For some of the city’s residents, the Pongal holidays are an opportunity to get in touch with their rural roots, be it by visiting their ancestral villages or even making quick getaways to nearby districts to soak in the harvest festivities with farmers.

A. Dhanasekaran, an IIT-Delhi graduate who works with an automobile company as an industrial designer, makes it a point to visit his ancestral home in Edayan Pal Sori, a hamlet in Cuddalore district, which is a three-and-a-half hour drive from the city.

The 33-year-old’s parents and younger brother manage their 25-acre plot of agricultural land there, where they farm paddy and gram and celebrate Pongal. “The most important festivities are on Pongal day, which we refer to as ‘Perum Pongal,’ said Mr. Dhanasekaran.

“The festivities begin early in the day when we construct a tank (‘thotti’) using red sand or bricks. This becomes the sacred spot where the Pongal is cooked as an offering (‘padayal’) to the gods thanking them for the good harvest,” he said. This year however, Mr. Dhanasekaran’s farm has had only an average harvest.

There are subtle differences in the festivities from district to district, where farmers have localised the festivities over the years. It is also common for farm heads to celebrate the day alongside workers.

Ravindran Padmanabhan, founder of Chennai-based Innowave Healthcare, plans to visit his native place Ellayapalayam village in Nellore district.

“Bhogi (celebrated the day before Pongal) is in fact grander than Pongal itself in Andhra villages. It is great to visit our ancestral home this time of the year,” he said.

Another well-known technologist from the city, Kiruba Shankar is ready to entertain American guests this year at his 9-acre Vaksana farmhouse in Rettanai near Tindivanam. Freelance writers Zach Marks and Resham Gellatly, who run the website www.chaiwallahsofindia.com, will be arriving in the city soon and proceed onto to the farm to experience Pongal in the rural settings. “It is a harvest festival and there can be no better setting to experience it than at a village,” Zach Marks says. “We have already experienced Pongal once before in rural Tamil Nadu, at Madurai in 2011, when we also witnessed the Jallikattu. That was all about the craziness of the bull taming. But this year around, we want to experience something different.”

When visiting one’s ancestral home is not possible, there are other options — several corporate employees have started taking breaks from their grinding city routines to visit villages nearby.

Public charitable trust National Agro Foundation, which is involved in rural activities including rural tourism in Kancheepuram and nearby districts, organises a ‘Rural Day Out’ programme for corporates and school students at its centre in Illedu village, Kacheepuram.

Visitors get to sample life away from the din of the city and even participate in rural games like ‘uriyadi’, where blind-folded persons attempt to break pots. (The organisation’s website is www.nationalargo.org.in)

The districts adjoining the city, especially Kancheepuram and Tiruvallurt, have several paddy farmers who celebrate the harvest festival. The more colourful festivities, however, take place in the southern districts of the State.

Chef Zilli in The City

You know you’ve met extraordinary talent when a chef feeds you aubergine and it is lip-smacking delicious. But then it should hardly be surprising if the chef in question is Aldo Zilli and the dish his signature fare.

Best known for his fleet of Italian restaurants in London, international celebrity chef Zilli, 57, made his Asia debut in December with Zerruco by Zilli at The Ashok in Delhi. Zerruco is a contemporary Mediterranean dining restaurant that Zilli has co-branded with the main promoters Kashif Farooq and Prashant Ojha of the Urban Pind fame. A popular TV chef, Zilli is also a best-selling author (he has written over 12 cookbooks including two autobiographies) and a successful restaurateur (he opened his first at age 26 in Soho).

In the indoor dining area of the restaurant, Zilli is reclined on a cream couch with his arms spread out on the backrest. He is wearing a short-sleeved chef’s coat with Delhi winter being more “like spring” as he puts it and quite unlike London. A skylight in the textured ceiling just above the bar washes the interiors in natural light. The walls are panelled with shiny dark wood and embedded with mirrors. It was a much-anticipated visit, says Zilli of his maiden trip to India. “Indian food is a big part of the global cuisine especially in England. A trip here was much anticipated in the last ten years. So when I got a chance I jumped at it,” he says.

Zilli sold his seven London restaurants two years back and is in partnership with 18 restaurants at present. In 2012, he teamed up with The San Carlos Group of Italian restaurants to launch their second Cicchetti restaurant at Piccadilly Circus. This all-day Italian dining in the heart of London is famous for its small plate, tapas-style cuisine, something Zilli has brought to Zerruco as well. “The offerings here will be the same as London, which is small dishes so that people can try 3-4 different dishes. That I think is the way to eat anyway. I don’t like big portions of food anymore,” he says. The menu here has been designed entirely by him and he has prepared an entire section just for vegetarians. “We cater to everyone and there is lots of vegetarian food on the menu. What I have in mind here is to keep the menu very fresh and source the main ingredients locally.”

This may be his first trip to India, but Zilli says he has sampled a lot of Indian food in England and finds a lot of similarities between the Indian and Italian food cultures. “In England, English chefs have to be taught everything, but you guys come to the kitchen with flavours already that you’ve learnt from your parents and grandparents, much like Italians. We have a similarity in the sense that we both like flavour in our food. Our food is not bland, especially in the south of Italy from where I come.”

Zilli’s journey from Italy to England is a remarkable story and would make for a silver screen blockbuster.

The youngest of nine children, Zilli says his older siblings went to work on their farm while he was left behind to help his mother in the kitchen. That is when he learnt cooking. “We were a very poor family and food was at a premium. The farm offered everything, but what grew in the farm had to be sold for money,” he says. 

At 17, he left home to realise his dream of working in a kitchen. The reason being one most Indian boys who enjoy cooking would identify with. “My father didn’t want me to be a chef as he thought cooking was done by women,” he says. He first went to Germany and France to learn the trade. “I learned the best skills and techniques in France,” he says. In 1976, Zilli moved to England. “I met some friends there and got a job straight away.” An entrepreneur at heart, Zilli saw a gap in the market that he could fill and pretty well too. “Italian food in London in those days was terrible. It wasn’t cooked by Italian chefs. People were cooking oily lasagne, overcooked pasta and terrible pizzas,” he points out. At 26, he began running his first restaurant, Il Siciliano on Dean Street in Soho, which was the most successful Italian restaurant in those days. He thus began building his spectacular empire.

The scene here in Delhi he admits is a lot different. There is plenty of good competition.

“There are some good Italian restaurants in Delhi and I’m looking forward to competition,” he smiles. Zilli will be back in town in February. “I will be here every season to change the menu as I like to cook with seasonal food. Other than that I am in contact with my chefs here every day. We Skype, it’s easy.”

By Supriya Sharma:  I E :05th January 2014 12:00 AM

Last Updated: 04th January 2014 01:02 PM

Invisible restaurateur: 34-year-old Priyank Sukhija runs 19 eateries in Delhi, yet few have heard of him

Sruthijith K K, ET Bureau Jan 9, 2014, 05.08AM IST

NEW DELHI: This holiday season, for Christmas or for New Year, if you had gone out for dinner at some of Delhi's upscale markets - Connaught Place, Khan Market, Haus Khas Village, Malcha Marg, Sunder Nagar or Nehru Place, for instance - there is a good chance that you went to one of his establishments. There is also a good chance, even if you eat at his restaurants regularly, that you have never heard of him.
Priyank Sukhija (34) is arguably Delhi's most successful restaurateur - with a business model that's exciting plenty of investors around the country. He runs 19 restaurants in the city (all but one are profit-making). His establishments span more than 100,000 sq. ft of prime real estate. Three more will open for business before April.

His eateries are on track to clock Rs 100 crore in business this fiscal. He is planning ten more restaurants in two years. This year, he intends to open formats serving Indian food in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

There is a secret behind Sukhija's ability to expand so rapidly- a network of partners who are happy to invest in his ideas and let him run the show. Different people are partners in different projects. Bhupinder Singh Kochchar of the VI John group is a partner in some projects.

NO PLANS FOR PE PLACEMENT

Amit Bagga of Bagga Link motor dealerships and Umang Tiwari of Delhi-based Tiwari Builders are his other partners.


Because of Sukhija's recent track record, he says he is able to set good terms for himself in partnerships. He will bring 10% of the investment required, but will take 50% of equity. "The rest is a fee for the privilege of partnering with me," Sukhija says, in all seriousness. But he does everything else, from executing the concept, hiring the chefs and the staff, and the day to day running of the restaurant. "I only partner with people I have known for years. That way, if the place makes a loss, the partner doesn't turn on me," he said.





Sukhija's gastronomic reach in Delhi is most visible in Hauz Khas Village, a chic market heaving with fashion boutiques and quirky eateries. Apart from the three-level Out of the Box cafe, which serves a wide range of dishes, he runs the Asian restaurant Fat Ninja, Fork You, which serves American, Italian and Tex-mex cuisines, Raas, which serves Pakistani cuisine, and Chamanlal and Sons, a quirky bar named after the legend of a lawyer who drowned in the Hauz Khas Lake.

Strangely, Sukhija is not as well known as he ought to be even among the small circle of restaurateurs. "I have never heard of him but I have eaten at Raas and I thought the food was good," said Anjan Chattarjee, the founder of Speciality Group of restaurants, which runs brands such as Oh! Calcutta and Mainland China. "But if he runs 19 restaurants in Delhi, he is a rock star. It is unusual and it's great that he is creating new formats," said Chattarjee, whose company runs 107 restaurants in 23 cities.   Sukhija says people like the experience at his eateries because he executes with painstaking attention to detail. "I travel the world looking for ideas, I oversee everything - decor, music, menu, staff uniform, cutlery, you name it." He says he doesn't like to experiment.
"People want the food they are familiar with, executed well, in a casual atmosphere where nobody is judging them," he says. "I tell my waiters - if you can't speak English well, it's OK. Tell the guest you don't speak English and speak in Hindi." If his eateries are consolidated into a single company, he will own about 60-65% of the equity and a little more in share of profits. That is because he wholly owns some of the most profitable assets, such as Lazeez Affaire.
He said he has no plans to go for a private equity placement or an IPO just yet. "I don't need the money. We have no debt and there are enough HNIs who want to put money in any project. I can think up, and you know, I really can't be bothered to go and spend my evenings in Chandigarh or Kanpur because I have some project coming up there. I work very hard, but my lifestyle is important to me," he said.

Sukhija says he started Skooter nightclub so he and his friends could party. Otherwise, he doesn't like the nightclub business. "You have to keep doing new things to attract clients.

In restaurants, you develop a good concept and execute well, it will run on its own for years." Sukhija's first venture was a bowling alley, which he started with capital from his father, a corporate lawyer, while still in first year of college. Just as he was about to open for business, the Uphaar tragedy of 1997 happened, in which 59 people died in a fire.

Following the incident, the Delhi government banned operations out of basements. His venture failed before it could collect its first rupee. He still refused to follow the family line into the legal profession, and when a family-owned building in Malcha Marg was vacated in 1999, he started his first restaurant there.

Sukhija, who's had fire-related accidents in two of his restaurants, is very careful about safety, he says. In April 2013, two security guards died in an accident in one of his eateries. That was the worst setback of his career, he admits.