Features: Magazine | Literary Review | Life | Metro Plus | Open Page | Education Plus | Book Review | Business | SciTech | NXg | Friday Review | Cinema Plus | Young World | Property Plus | Quest |

The world on Chennai’s platter

PHOTO: S.R. RAGHUNATHAN

HALE AND HAPPY (From left) Chefs Joseph, Mickael, Thom, Giovanna and Willi

Some of them are young. Most of them have an accent. But, they all have something to share that they have brought from faraway countries. Meet expat chefs, who are seasoning Chennai with international flavours. And, their watchword is authenticity.

Shawarmas, dim sums, a carpet of plaited spaghetti, a rain of Saint Emilion ... welcome to the world of Chennai’s international chefs. It’s a small group now, but their numbers are set to grow as Chennaiites are progressively developing a taste for world cuisine. With more Chennaiites travelling abroad, their culinary knowledge and tastes are widening. A group of “Indians with continental taste”, as Prego’s chef Giovanna calls them, is emerging. The expat experts are aware that they can’t cheat their clients and pretend their food is authentic when it is not. A chef even admits that the much-travelled Chennaiite sometimes knows the dishes better than he does. However, world cuisine still has a long way to go before it becomes a reflex in the city. So far, it has attracted globe-trotting Indians and homesick international travellers.

Chef Willi, the one who has spent the longest time here, is glad the trend has shifted from 70 per cent foreign clients when he started to work for The Park to 70 per cent Indians when he left the hotel. For chef Mickael, when customers enter Ecstasy, “they should feel like they are not in India anymore.” In Kefi, chef Mehmet has brought home a Mediterranean tradition. In Greece, smashing plates is an expression of the eponym ‘kefi’ (spirit of joy and frenzy). Give Rs. 200 towards the education of deprived children and you’ll be allowed to do it in a corner of the roof-top restaurant. It’s for luck. Expat chefs provide you with different tastes and make you live a different experience altogether. In Absolute, Indians sometimes find the portions too small. The concept is not to serve just one dish that would stuff your stomach but to allow you to savour several of them. And, the restaurant has two different menus for lunch and dinner because “in the West, people usually have a quick and light lunch and spend more time on dinner,” says chef Mike, who was earlier with the restaurant.

A lot of the chefs acknowledge that they have had to adjust to Indian tastes. Chef Michel of La Boulangerie says he has had to sweeten some of his pastries. “I want to bring new tastes, without imposing anything and without upsetting local traditions.”

Chef Joseph in Azulia has adopted a different strategy. The dishes taste the way they would in Greece or Morocco, but are served with a Harissa sauce for those who don’t find the dishes spicy enough. “I don’t want to add chillies to my dishes because it would alter the taste of the food.” At Azulia, Joseph will help you choose your dishes. Sparky’s chef Thom assures his menu is authentic American. . What he does is serve dishes that would be “friendly to the local palate,” such as Cajun cuisine that is more spicy. “But, a burger should taste like a burger!”

In most of the five-star hotels, the majority of the ingredients are imported. As chef Giovanna explains: “The difficulty in cooking Italian food is that you need very good products and, here, there is lack of consistency.” The chefs are sometimes inspired by seasonal local products. Chef Joseph has created a mango tiramisu for Azulia and chef Mickael, a chilli chocolate ice-cream for Ecstasy “to show something people know in a different light”.

(Photos: R. Ravindran, R. Shivaji Rao, R. Ragu, M. Karunakaran, V. Ganesan)

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail