Sukumar Das, a Telangana-based entrepreneur who introduced paragliding and paramotoring in Hyderabad is now on a mission to add fresh flavours to adventure. Through his company Vertical world aerosports and adventure along with Telangana tourism, he is on a mission to popularise the rural cuisine of the State and give food lovers a taste of authentic homemade food. Sukumar is working to set up eateries that specialise in offering only rural foods.
The first such eatery will be a part of the Telangana Aerosports And Adventure village that will be up and rolling from October this year informs Sukumar. In contrast to a regular menu that features manchurian, aloo 65, kadhai chicken , dal tadka and naan, Sukumar’s menu will be all about annam, pappu, charu, kodi kura, chepa pulusu, boti fry, sakinalu and more, all cooked by villagers. in doing so, Sukumar is doing away with employing trained chefs/ culinary school or graduates. He explains, “Trained professionals work with measurements, recipes and rules while cooking. This is not the case with home food. Real rural food is rustic and comes without the complex use of spices and standard formula gravies/ curries.”
The Telangana Aerosports And Adventure village that will house the eateries will be coming up at tourist hangout spots on the outskirts, especially near the new water barrages like Ranganayaka Sagar and Kondapochamma reservoir in Siddipet, Udandapur and Karivena reservoir in Mahabubnagar. These reservoirs are part of the Kaleshwaram project in Telangana and are becoming a huge tourist attraction.
As a food lover and traveller, Sukumar sees huge potential in pure rural flavours. His idea is to popularise food from the village of Telangana and open a dialogue on food and community culture. “A lot of youth in the villages need a supplementary source of income. If a food community is set up to market their food and culture, it will not only be beneficial to them, but to the people of Telangana as well,” he reasons.
The food project is set to roll from October. Sukumar’s teams have done several food trials with the department of tourism and the feedback is positive, he adds. “Tourism department is being very supportive of the idea because there is a lot of scope for the project,” he said.
With all social media platforms focusing on rural and local food, are cooking demonstrations for customers on the cards? Sukumar says, “There are a lot of plans. I want to start with giving the people a taste of the food that is cooked over firewood, paired with jonna rotte , replace beer and carbonated drinks with majjiga (butter milk) made from buffalo milk or toddy.”
So, the next time you want to taste rural Telangana cuisine head to one of these adventure villages where after a high-flying experience in the sky, you can treat your taste buds to something rusticly flavourful.
