In search of kulfi
“Follow me!” says Daniel, who’s out running an errand for his mother. A resident of Sasthri Nagar in Pulianthope, he knows exactly where the famous ‘kulfi ice’ is made. We follow him into a narrow alley, which opens out into a hive of closely-knit houses — 19th Street. “Here’s where they make it,” he announces and sets off. There are telltale signs all around — a young woman empties a bucket of freshly-washed and dried plastic kulfi moulds into a basket. We peek into a household and see milk bubbling in a gigantic cauldron.
S. Yacob, a veteran kulfi-maker, ushers us into his unit — a one-room home, where a semi-thick concoction of milk, almond shavings and sugar is being filled in palm-sized plastic containers by his colleague Abdul Kuduse. Yacob has been making kulfi for 40 years. “I sold kulfi made in Triplicane when I was a young man and gradually learnt the recipe,” says the 71-year-old.
Pulianthope is Chennai’s kulfi hot-spot. Most kulfi vendors selling the delicacy on tricycles at parks and beaches buy the frozen dessert from this locality. “I sell them in VOC Nagar,” says Yacob. Their men travel as far as Aynavaram and Chintadripet on tricycles to sell kulfi. It was ‘Joker’ Bhai who first started making kulfi in Pulianthope. “His kulfi was legendary,” says Yacob. “But he’s very old now. His sons have taken over from him.”
There are over 50 kulfi makers in Pulianthope alone. “We start work by afternoon and head out to sell by 6 p.m.,” says Yacob. “I boil 25 litres of milk until it thickens and add sugar, corn flour and cut badam (almonds) once it cools. We then fill them in the dabbas , secure them with rubber caps and throw them all in boxes filled with ice till the kulfi freezes.” Yacob is known as ‘Manda bhai’ amongst his customers. “This is because of my bald patch. Abdul here is called ‘vella mudi thatha’ (white-haired old man),” he grins, as he would when his tricycle is surrounded by children.
C. Kunhiraman General Stores
The best mango ice cream in Chennai is sold in the most unlikeliest of places — under the shade of a gigantic tree below the Royapuram Bridge. The store is a treasure of a place that’s been making its own ice cream for over 60 years. “Please take a seat inside,” says the genial man, who scoops a generous portion of the sunshine-yellow dessert into a plastic cup.
We step in only to step back in time. The shop — with deep-brown wooden shelves and glass-fronted sliding doors, a framed black-and-white photo of an earnest-looking man with a toothbrush moustache, and sacks of rice and strings of shampoo sachets — has an old-world charm to it. Kunhiraman was an ordinary man who came to Madras from Calicut 90 years ago. He set up a grocery store in Royapuram after several years of hard work.
“This area had a big population of Anglo-Indians at the time,” says K.T. Ashok, who runs the shop. Kunhiraman learnt to make ice cream to cater to their demands. Although Ashok doesn’t know where exactly Kunhiraman got the recipe from, he thinks it may have been picked up from the Anglo-Indian residents of the area. The ice cream is delicious. What makes it more exciting is the ambience of its birth place — one can choose to eat it seated inside the shop or outside under the tree. A scoop is priced at Rs. 30. Ashok says that there was a time when it was sold for Re. 1. “It was served in glass cups that cost much more than the ice cream,” he remembers.
“But we replaced them with plastic, since customers started taking away the glass cups,” he laughs.
Kunhiraman General Stores has no plans of branding their ice cream or expanding business. They’re happy selling a nameless mango ice cream that remains etched in one’s memory long after the last spoonful has been had.
Maharaja Ice cream
Mango ice cream served inside frozen mango skin. If there’s anything that can set one off on a summer afternoon into the mad chaos of Audiappa Street in Sowcarpet, it’s this. Is this even possible? We reach Maharaja Ice cream huffing and puffing, to find out that it is. A sleepy salesman and ordinary interiors make one wonder if the journey was worth it. But the moment we peel the top skin off the mango that holds the ice cream, the novelty of it all impresses us.
Priced at Rs. 50, it tastes good — mango fibre sometimes make its way into the ice cream. We polish it off gazing at the view outside — of a bustling store selling provisions and cycle-rickshaws that raise dust on a winding street. Maharaja mainly supplies ice creams in bulk to weddings. The owner Ram Vyas chanced upon this rather unique way of serving ice cream during his travels to Mumbai. They also sell a variety of kulfis and even orange ice cream packed in frozen orange skin.
