Stone ground mustard, spices, marinated bekti fish wrapped in a banana leaf and steamed. Sounds interesting, right? That is Bhapi Bhetki, a dish all the way from Bengal. The authentic taste and aroma of a Bengali grandma’s cuisine will be presented by chef Subrata Debnath at the Bengali Food festival called Ranna Ghar at Spice Haat in the Hyatt Regency Chennai, from July 24 to August 2.
“We call it Raana Gahr as it means ‘from the rasois (kitchens) of Bengal. We will bring in authentic Bengali taste for Chennaiites, a taste of home for the Bengalis here and a new delight to the tastebuds of the other people here,” Debnath says.
So, what is special about this food festival that we cannot find at any other Bengali restaurant in the city? For starters, a special delivery of the fishes from Bengal is being flown down here.
“In Bengal, we find sweet water fish, unlike here where only sea water fishes are available. All our sea food including fishes and prawns will be from Kolkata,” says Debnath.
Another unique element about the festival is that the cuisine will be pure and not a fusion of any other cuisine.
“We will not use any garam masalas or much of garlic. Our traditional spices called panchphoron will be used. It is a mixture of five spices, mustard, fenugreek seed, cumin seed, aniseed, and black cumin seed. We will use mustard oil only and the big banana leaves, not the small ones found here,” explains the chef.
CE asked chef Debnath to share some of his must-try signature dishes. “I would always recommend that people to try my Chingri (prawn) Malai curry that’s cooked in coconut milk and Topse bhaja, a deep fried fish and for vegetarians,” he shares.
For dessert, apart from the ever-‘white’ rosogollas, sandesh, flavoured cottage cheese cake and darbesh, sweetened gram flour will be available.
The fest is on between July 24 and August 2. For reservations, contact 61001234.