Much like his familial history, chef Atul Kochhar’s culinary oeuvre has evolved over time.
With a grandfather who was a baker and a father who ran a catering company, Kochhar, the first Indian chef to be awarded a Michelin star, way back in 2001 for London’s Tamarind, has had quite the ride, with many ups and a few downs.
It is perhaps only fitting then that the London-based, Jamshedpur-born chef’s latest restaurant, set to open in Gurugram, is called SAGA.
Kochhar announced the venture, in association with restaurateur Vishal Anand, during a recent press meet organised in the Capital at Farzi Cafe, Aerocity.
The menu itself will be a reflection of Kochhar’s long-held fascination with “textures, sensations and flavour profiles.
My menus are always evolving and changing, as per the seasons and the regions I explore.
At SAGA we’re looking across India for inspiration, and while there are certain regions and communities whose food I’m keen to showcase first, there will always be new ones to discover since we’re such a vast country,” said Kochhar, who doesn’t believe in trumpeting changes in his menu as a marketing ploy, but rather a natural progression of the experiential dining that him and Anand intend to offer at SAGA.
“The focus will be on the chef’s tasting menu, which will comprise of seven to nine dishes, the best of our best out of a selection of 24-30 items. I’m not a fan of bloated menus, with too many options,” said the 51-year-old.
As for the regions that he’s especially interested in showcasing, Kochhar said, “The food of the Chettiars (Chettinad) really intrigues me, as well as that of certain other communities in Andhra. Himachali is another fascinating cuisine, and there’ll be food from Kerala and Tamil Nadu as well. I’ll also be doing some dishes from Assam and Tripura, along with a little bit of Meghalayan. Naga cuisine also has some interesting elements.”
That being said, Kochhar eschewed the fiery Bhut Jolokia (one of the world’s hottest chillies and emblematic of Naga food) for a gentler, softer pepper when he opened the well-regarded Kanishka in London in 2019, which is an exploration of the cuisines of Northeast India.
“The Bhut Jolokia is incredible but much too hot for western palates and even most Indian palates, and it tends to numb your taste buds to the other ingredients of whichever dish it’s in and I don’t want that,” said Kochhar.
That isn’t the only fire Kochhar has had to put out in recent years. In 2018, he was asked to step down as the chef-patron of Benares, the iconic Mayfair restaurant which he had helped establish, after a series of perceived Islamophobic tweets and his partnership with the JW Marriott Marquis Hotel in Dubai was terminated for the same reason (Benares has since been stripped of its star in the latest Michelin guide). Another venture of his in Mumbai, called Not Really Indian, also shuttered.
“Look, that’s a part of life. You go up and come down, and have many successes as well as failures. It’s a human tendency to try and remember the successes and forget your failures but I try and be more realistic. I want to not just remember my highs, but also my lows, because they help inspire me,” said Kochhar. And so the SAGA continues.