Art in everyday spaces

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Art in everyday spaces
the first pure still-life
born out of need
to live, to grow

what we do
what we think
how we create

how we create
how we express

The dosa gets my vote

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Four hungry people. One Giant Paper Dosa. Lots of coconut chutney, and lots of sambar.

Paper Dosa at Sunder's, Kabutarkhana, King's Circle

Have you tried sharing a paper dosa? That first crumbling of the perfect cylinder shape, the vain attempts to preserve some semblance of orderly eating...until chaos descends and everyone is just eating whatever crumbs they can find? What fun :)

Ordering four separate dosas just isn't the same, is it?

Sunders is a regular stop on my forays to King's Circle market. Apart from the paper dosa, they serve a wacky menu with several different dosa varieties (including a schezwan dosa).

They do a decent masala-dosa as well. I'm not a big fan of the masala-dosa. But it does seem to have found its place under the sun. Food writer Nilanjana Roy gave the masala dosa her vote for "national dish of India" in an article in Outlook earlier this year. She says: The dosa has crept into our lives in a quiet revolution, a stealthy and entirely bloodless coup. It can be found in dhabas in the Himalayas, stuffed with exotic ingredients in five-star restaurants...It can be stuffed with paneer, or with chicken and keema fillings for the unregenerate carnivore, but it’s the masala dosa that flies its flag across India. You can even, experimenting with spinach and carrot fillings, create a suitably tricolour masala dosa, while retaining the potato stuffing that is the trademark of the true Udupi stalwart. We can continue to argue over the rest of the menu for a genuinely nationalist Indian banquet, but for the moment, the dosa gets my vote."
So what say? The masala-dosa as a national dish? Sacrilege? :)

If I were to think about Bombay, instead of the whole country, then here's my list of the top three popular eats in the city:
- Vada pav
- Bhelpuri
- Dosa

The Indian Food

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India is a land of diversity.Her myriad landscapes, varied tongues, resplendent festivals and multi-ethnicity reflect the culture of this ancient land. indian cuisine, which is as diverse and splendid as the colorful country, has gained connoisseurs, even among the rich and the renowned, across the globe. Since the pre-Christian era, the aroma of the famous indian spices wafted far enough to attract traders, and eventually invaders, from distant lands.

My parents, like most true-blood Indians, love to shower people with their hospitality and feed them till they’re almost ready to burst. We Indians are known for our need to treat our guests with the utmost care and generosity, and one common way we all seem to achieve in doing so is through our food. Food holds a very special place in any Indian household. No festivity is complete without a table laden with colourful dishes end to end, enough to please

a king.It’s no wonder that out of all the rooms in a home, many Indians take the most pride in showing you their kitchens. Truly, we love food, and our life surrounds it. Our conversations, no matter how they begin always seem to divert to the food related with the topic in question. A simple wedding announcement would automatically lead to the designing of the menu. Even meeting up with a long lost friend would be done over lunch or dinner, over food they could reminisce about.

While our meals may be laced with rich aromatic flavours, what I look forward to the most at any Indian-inspired party is the platter of appetizers. Indian hors d’oeuvres range from savoury street food, like the most loved samosas (deep fried pastry filled with potatoes) and pakodas (spiced fritters), to the ever famous tandoori tikkas (marinated meat grilled in a clay oven). They are steamed, grilled and fried. They come in various sizes and shapes, some that can be daintily picked by two fingers, and others that require a spoon and lots of napkins. No matter in what form, they each have something special to offer, and no cocktail party would regret having them.

Ask any one who has ever walked the streets of any major Indian city, be it Delhi, Mumbai or Bangalore; and they will attest to the fact that no evening stroll is complete without making a stop at one of the many hawker stalls that surround every busy area in these cities. Street after street, stall after stall, you will be greeted by smiling faces and tempting plates that urge you to come and give it a try. Smothered with spicy and tangy chutneys, yogurt and tons of other fixings, each plate creates a whole new tale in your mouth.

For beginners, eating an Indian meal might be somewhat of problem let alone cooking a balanced Indian meal. Indian food is designed to be eaten with the group. Unlike western food, Indian food cannot be eaten or served without a combination. Thus, even though you like that curried vegetable or chutney, try not to eat it by itself. Combine it with rice or Indian bread or with other dishes. This will help you enjoy the meal more and will not give any digestion problems later.

And don't even get me start talking about Indian Sweets, When it comes to Indian Taste, Sweets are sweeter than sugar , filled with yummy juices!

Indian TEA (a.k.a CHAI )

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Welcome to India – where each of the 1 billion odd people will be addicted to tea ( popularly called chai) or as in the case of IT sectors coffee (their cash surplus allows them a richer beverage)

Come 4 p.m. and everyone’s eagerly waiting for their cup of tea – cutting chai as popularly known in Mumbai. Offices have a chai-wala (person who sells tea desk to desk) come with his tiny aluminium kettle which surprisingly has tea enough for a hundred people! And if you notice, pan India, it’s the same aluminium kettle. Be it rains or summer or winter, the aluminium kettle goes along with all seasons. If not a chai-wala, then there are those numerous chai – stalls again very popular among college students and those small offices where people find a getaway and a place to unwind. Of course, this chai ka pyaala(cup of tea) is often accompanied with paav vada ( Indian burger ) or samosa or bhajji! At home, all the home makers prepare tea for themselves, as if it’s the start of the day. It helps them “look forward” to the rest of the day! Infact “high tea” is a commonly used term in India in which social events take place. Families now prefer inviting their guests for high tea inorder to save the extra workload from dinner / lunch! Shop keepers will eagerly be waiting for their chai at around 3:30 – 4 p.m. Infact so much so, that chai addicts get headaches and irritation if they don’t get their cup of tea. Its not just their cup of tea if they bunk their tea time!

That’s chai time – when little poor children run along the platform of train station shouting chai chai chai in their typical accent; the many addicts who will do anything for their cup of chai; and the amazing social bonding that happens over cup of chai. Like the advertisement goes “ tata tea… dimakh daudega nahi, bhagega…. Tez bahut tez!”

As if the variety in brands were not enough, tea comes in variety – just like coffee – from black tea to half paani tea(half water) to full doodh (full milk)tea to sugar free and extra sugar to masala chai to flavoured chai from different parts of the Himalayas! There always must be Parle G glucose biscuit or Marie Biscuit accompanying the afternoon tea. Morning tea is another topic by itself. Ridiculously, no two people have tea of the same type. Each have their own style of making tea and especially critical is the water / milk content in chai. Sugar should and must be served separately to guests to avoid the fuss over “how much sugar you have!”

India produces and consumes more tea than any other country in the world, including the famous Assam tea and Darjeeling tea.The cultivation and brewing of tea in India has a long history of applications in traditional systems of medicine and for consumption. The consumption of tea in India was first clearly documented in the Ramayana (750-500 BC).

Today, India is one of the largest tea producers in the world, though over 70% of the tea is consumed within India itself. A number of renown teas, such as Darjeeling, also grow exclusively in India.

Chai – the most loved beverage, yet the most fussed over beverage.

An Indian Tea in making!

Tunde Kababs - Aminabad , Lucknow

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What is the first thought that comes to your mind when you hear the word "LUCKNOW" ? the response of any Indian would be "Nawabs" and "Kababs" I was born & raised 80 Km from Lucknow so was lucky enough to spends many delicious weekends there. The famous and old Tunde Kabas is a "Kabab Shop" in Aminabad,Lucknow. Its a pilgrimage for food lovers.Lucknow is proud of its Kebabs. The Kakori Kebabs, Galawat ke Kebabs, Shami Kebabs, Boti Kebabs, Patili-ke-Kebabs, Ghutwa Kebabs and Seekh Kebabs are some of the others among the known varieties.
I am a vegetarian but still I have been to Tunde Kababs (with friends and family!) enough times to take it as a fact and a non arguable universal truth that "Tunde's are the best Kababs in the Milky Way". Legend has it that a rich Lucknowi nobleman once lost all his teeth, yet couldn’t give up his love for kababs. So he ordered his master chef to whip up a kabab that he could eat without missing his teeth, meaning, the kabab had to just melt in his mouth. So successful was the experiment that the recipe lived on.


Food has history in Lucknow. The famous Tunda Kebab is so named because it was a specialty of an one-armed chef. The uniqueness of this kebab is the masala (home made spices)which is a zealously guarded family secret and prepared by women in the family. It is said to incorporate 160 spices.
I counted it in my list as it denotes not just the Avadh delicacies but a century old tradition of taste that has been an inherent feature of the ‘Land Of Avadh’.
Tunde Kababs on Facebook.
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