World on My Plate

Chinese and Italian are now passé. The Indian foodie is chasing flavours from Austria, Uzbekistan and the Caribbean.

It is Thurday night and Wildfire is stuffed to the gills. A delicious woody aroma thickens the air as sounds of laughter and conversation abound at every table. It is unusual for a restaurant to be this busy on a weeknight, but for Wildfire, it is simply everyday business. Located in Hotel Crowne Plaza, Gurgaon, this eatery is the only one of its kind in the country to offer authentic Brazilian grill or the churrasco. As glistening skewers of meat sizzle on the red-hot embers of wood, the line of guests only gets longer and longer outside the restaurant.

In a country where an odd dalliance with kibbeh and a brief flirtation with sushi are considered as having sampled global cuisine, it is amazing that restaurants like Wildfire have managed to acquire such a following. While Mediterranean and Japanese eateries continue to inundate the market with their trademark dishes, little-known international cuisines are slowly clawing their way through onto the Indian culinary map. Tired of the same old safe bets, people are turning to cuisines from Uzbekistan, Austria and the Caribbean for gastronomic salvation.

However, Indians have not always been this experimental with lesser-known international cuisines. Many such eateries have died a quiet death to make way for something regular and wholesome for cautious customers. Take Boyarin for instance, the Russian restaurant at the Ashok, Delhi, that was shut down a few years ago to give way to an Italian restaurant, which was later converted into an F-Bar and Lounge.

Some of the international restaurants that have suddenly bewitched of the Indian gourmet have in fact been around for ages, waiting patiently for the true connoisseur to come and rescue them from obscurity. Arthur’s Theme in Pune, which serves authentic French fare, had been lounging about in Koregaon Park for the past 12 years till the infotech boom happened and brought with it the species known as the ‘well travelled global Indian’. Sue’s Place in Bangalore tells a similar tale. Though Sue has been whipping up hot and spicy Caribbean fare for more than a decade now, she has only now begun to get her due.

With India having transformed into a global village in the last decade, New World cuisines have come knocking at our doors. Some of these cuisines appeal to the Indian foodie because of their close proximity to Indian flavours.

“Delhi is known for its awesome kebabs and tandoori fare. These too are a form of grill, which happens to be the principal style of cooking in Brazil. This similarity appeals to our customers,” says Anderson Bento da Silva, who has been specially flown in from Brazil to supervise the kitchen at Wildfire.

Such is the popularity of Wildfire that it has won culinary awards twice in a row, and the influx of guests has been on constant upswing. Like a lot of other such restaurants, they source their ingredients from all over the world.

If you ever visit Wildfire, make sure to have the succulent fraldinha, which is a special cut of tenderloin marinated in aromatic herbs and spices, and then slow roasted over barbecue. Another speciality is the Peito de Pato or duck breast soaked in orange juice, olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper, and then grilled. Vegetarians can try out the abacaxi asaadi—pineapple dusted with honey and cinnamon and then roasted on a char grill.

Credit for this newfound awareness about international cuisines goes to the enthusiastic food and beverage (F&B) managers of most five stars in India. As they diligently organised festival after festival and flew in chefs from all parts of the world, the Indian customer slowly began to appreciate foreign tastes on his palate.

At Delhi’s Metropolitan Hotel, for instance, customers are regularly treated to gastronomic marvels from Hungary, Austria and even the Czech Republic. “The Czech festival that we organised way back in 2007 was immensely successful. We hadn’t expected such a positive response. But people were simply lapping up the food, especially the desserts,” says Rajesh Khanna, F&B operations head, the Metropolitan. Even now, customers come back and ask for the creamy southern Czech potato soup with mushrooms, the tender svickora or chicken on sour cream, and the crunchy kifles or nut rolls.

While hotels are doing their bit with festivals and special menus, it is the standalone eateries that have spearheaded the change. These restaurants offer a different experience from the glamorous environs of upmarket hotels. Cosy and comfy, these homely spaces don’t just look at offering a meal but a slice of life. Sue’s place, the Caribbean restaurant nestled in a small street in Indiranagar, Bangalore, is a shining example in this context. One can also hear strains of reggae as Sue bustles around the place playing the perfect hostess. “I have been born and brought up in Tobago. Caribbean is the only food I know! Being a thousand miles away from home, I would often feel homesick and would miss my mother’s cooking. That’s when I decided to open this place some 12 years back,” says Sue. Her restaurant was a culmination of her three great loves: cooking, music and meeting new people. So what brought her to India? “Matters of the heart, my dear. What do women not do for love?” she chuckles

Well, the Caribbean’s loss surely is India’s gain if the response to Sue’s restaurant is anything to go by. “At first, people were a little apprehensive about trying out the dishes. But nowadays, young people travel so much for business. They are curious about newer flavours,” she says. She sources a lot of her ingredients from back home—the scotch bonnet which gives the Jamaican jerk chicken its unique flavour, and the soursop fruit, which is a key ingredient in most tropical ice creams and punches. “We are still a very primitive race; we use a lot of barks and leaves and flowers in our food,” laughs Sue. If at Sue’s, make sure to have the zeera pork and the aromatic Tobago crab curry. “It is amazing that in a country like India, it is the pork dishes that sell the most. People also love the peanut punch, banana frappe and cassava porne that I make,” she adds.

Yet another eatery that smacks of homely flavours is Karavan, the quaint Uzbek restaurant located in posh Defence Colony Market, Delhi. The owner, Zulayakha Umarova, has decorated the space with hand-woven rugs from Bukhara and silk tapestries in traditional Uzbek folk prints and golden embroidery; and the in-house musicians strum their rubab while you eat. However, be prepared for slow service and wrong orders reaching your table, as the staff often looks uninterested and does not speak a word of English.

One has come to associate European food with ultra noveau chic eateries; hence, a joint that specialises in Austrian takeaway and home delivery would surprise many. According to culinary experts and food writers, Austrian food is the cuisine of the future, and Erna’s Gourmet stands as a testament to this. Located in Munirka, Delhi, this tiny catering service is run by Maya Shanker: “My grandmother was Austrian and I used to spend all my holidays with her in the kitchen. Erna’s Gourmet was an expression of an urge to create my Austria in Delhi.” When she launched this service, Maya feared that customers would find the food much too bland. “We soon found out that our anxieties were baseless, as our clients quite enjoyed the food,” she says.

Austrian food relies a lot on herbs like rosemary, parsley, chives and thyme. Though it is slightly heavy on cheese, ingredients like yoghurt, cucumber, olives, walnut and dill make it easy on the palate. “While earlier we used to specialise in bread spreads, sandwiches and finger food, since last year we have started delivering Ernalicious lunch boxes as well,” says Maya. The menu includes soups like cream of zucchini and pancake stripe soup along with a main dish of carinthian dumplings, the Austrian version of our momos. You can also order traditional delicacies like the mushroom goulash, cheese spaetzle or the Viennese escalope.

These eateries have done well because they had the foresight and the ability to take risks. Arthur’s Theme, for instance, chose to serve French fare when there were few takers for Continental food. Its owner Navtej Sawhney knew even at the time of opening the restaurant, that he would require a few years to settle in and educate people about the nuances of French cuisine.

Though French cuisine has been around for some time, at most coffee shops and restaurants in hotels, it is only now that the cuisine has gained momentum. “The biggest myth is that all French food is bland… We are in our 13th year now, and people have come to like the food. Everybody needs a change from the regular Indian and Chinese food, and even now, there aren’t many restaurants specialising in French food,” he says.

One can find youngsters, office executives and huge families wiping off the food from their plate. Some of the favourites at the restaurant are marinated fish in basil-enriched mustard sauce and braised duck in delicately flavoured citrus sauce. “For any restaurant specialising in international cuisine, the idea is to keep it simple. Keep the flavours authentic, as customers want to have a taste of the original, and not a modified version specially suited for Indian taste buds,” sums up Navtej.

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