City girl Sandhya S. Kumar is all smiles. She is the travelling chef/consultant of Raja Krishna Menon’s Chef . Says Sandhya, who has trained and worked with head chefs at the Four Seasons Hotel, Mumbai, and a few years of experience at The Oberoi and Marriott: “It is a title the cast and crew came up with as it is perhaps for the first time in Indian cinema that a chef has been roped in, and is travelling with, a film.”
Chef , a Bollywood adaptation of Jon Favreau’s Hollywood film by the same name, stars Saif Ali Khan in the lead role.
As food is a star of the film, Sandhya’s job is to serve the dishes required for the scenes in the film. It could be rice boiling on a stove in the background of a scene or food rolling out fast from the food truck. And it’s all “real” food. Not glue passing off as milk or shaving cream as fresh cream like they do in food photography.
Cine-goers will see Malayali cuisine featured at its best in the film as the film kick starts from Kerala. “Audiences will be treated to a smorgasbord of mouth-watering food shots. You will see dishes like dosa, appam, aviyal, payasam...Since we are travelling to other regions like Goa, Rajasthan and Delhi, food, ethnic to these locales will be highlighted too. I need to ensure that the dishes are authentic. An aviyal should look like an aviyal and not look like a dish that is passing off as an aviyal. The dish should also look appetising on screen,” says Sandhya, who is also a 'Food Stylist' and has handled a few food advertisements herself, and knows how best to present her dish on screen.
The food is prepared in a makeshift kitchen near the set. Everything is provided by the producers, right from the ingredients to the utensils. There is staff to help Sandhya with the mise en place and the cleaning.
The dishes are prepared fresh for each take. “I have made the same dish four or five times when there are retakes. But since everyone from the spot boy to the director is a foodie, the food does not go to waste. I guess my food tastes as good as it looks,” she giggles.
Saif, who dons the role of a chef, and Padmapriya, who plays a professional Bharatanatyam dancer in the movie, however, stick to a light diet while on shoot. “Saif does however indulge his taste buds once in a while. He is watching his diet and sticks to plain dal chawaal and sabji on most days.”
Apart from providing the food for the scenes, she also has to ensure Saif and Chandan Roy, who plays Saif’s friend, pull off the role of chefs. “As they play professional chefs, the same has to translate on screen, be it in the way they slice an onion or sauté vegetables. That flair and attitude of a chef has to be there.”
Sandhya, who will be travelling with them until the last scene featuring food is shot, says the movie will definitely whet the viewers’ appetites. “I think many will go on a food binge after watching the film,” she says with a laugh. Chef , produced by T-Series, Bandra West Pictures and Abundantia Entertainment, will reach theatres in 2017.
