Some months ago, a Tamil Nadu Minister stirred “pani-puri” waters with his remark about those Hindi-speaking people who come to South India in search of jobs. As a domicile of the state with roots in the North, it raised my antenna. I suddenly began spotting chaat counters everywhere I travelled. I get excellent Bhel, Sev-Batata Puri, Rajasthani and Gujarati Kachoris in Coonoor. Bangalore had chaat shops even in the eighties. Gangotri was one of the pioneers. Recently, I discovered a Gangotri – not sure if it's a copycat or a franchise – in the Adyar Gate area of Chennai. But even more surprising was finding a Chaat Shop outside a supermarket in the small town of Virajpet in Coorg. We now have North Indian restaurant brands like Mumbai’s Cream Centre and Moti Mahal coming to Chennai and Coimbatore.
Till the seventies, North Indians’ knowledge of “Madrasi” cuisine was limited to Idly, Dosa, Vada with Chutney, and Sambhar. The concept of ‘Sapad’ or South Indian meals was alien. Chettinad Chicken had not entered the Indian culinary lexicon then. In fact, few believed that Tamilians ate non-vegetarian food at all. So inevitably, after having their fill of vegetarian fare for a few days, Bengalis would start scouting for restaurants that served mutton or chicken (sea fish being taboo). 'Military Hotels' and 'Muniyandi Vilas’ were out of their tourist syllabus. Enquiries with locals and hotel staff, would take them to 'Buhari' on Mount Road in Chennai. Unable to handle the fiery curry cooked in a strange medium and disillusioned with the Biryani, they finally made peace with Chicken 65 with Parathas - a distant cousin of the Bengali 'Porota'. On getting back home they would talk endlessly about the trouble they had with food rather than the places visited.
Much has changed since then. Now it is easy to find Bengali food in most large cities of South India. While Banglore boasts of many Bengali speciality eateries in Chennai there are hotels around the hospital district of Greams Road offering “Bangla Meals.” The driver, as is always the case, has been a combination of economics and demographics. The IT Industry and educational institutions of Bangalore attract a large Bengali population who provide regular clientele for these ethnic outlets. Whereas in Tamil Nadu towns like Chennai and Vellore it is primarily medical tourists from Bengal and Bangladesh. But more interesting are the Bihari Dhabas and North East eating houses that one finds in Chennai now. The latter is a function of people from those states coming to the south for employment. Talk of a reverse swing, in recent years many new restaurants serving full-course South Indian menu have come up in Kolkata. Going beyond traditional popular Tamil fare, the city now boasts of true-blue Kerala food joints serving authentic vegetarian and non-vegetarian delicacies. Two of Kolkata’s oldest and snootiest clubs from the British Raj era have recently opened their doors to South Indian Coastal Food that is being lapped up by upper-crust ‘Bhadraloks’.
The real melting pot of regional cuisine is Delhi. From a time when the only recourse for those wanting to go beyond Butter Chicken, Dal Makhni and Biryani were the canteens of different state “Bhavans” - the capital now has incredible options of ethnic Indian food extending from Nagaland in the East to Gujarat, Rajasthan, Maharashtra in the West - sweeping through Assam, Bengal, Odisha - and Kashmir to Kanyakumari on the North-South axis. Seeing the growing popularity of regional food many of the Bhavans have upgraded their dining facilities opening them to the general public and turning them into commercially viable ventures managed by external vendors from earlier subsidised and loss-making units.
It is tempting to explain this trend in cliched terms of national integration and mainstreaming of remote geographies. Those inferences are correct to a large extent but do not tell the full story. There are sociological implications too. Firstly, it is an acknowledgement of India’s diversity. It is partly powered by demographic mobility that is dissolving parochial boundaries. With more cross-culture marriages, nuclear families and working couples, eating out is catching on. Though YouTube Cookery channels are nice to watch - the younger generation does not have either bandwidth or expertise to rush up their native culinary favourites so would either eat out or order in. Delhi now has home-delivery services and cloud kitchens for Indian ethnic food. One hears of ‘pop-ups’ and ‘cook-ins’ where chefs come home to make regional preparations for parties and family gatherings.
Meanwhile, as per a global listing done by Food Atlas Awards, India has been ranked fifth among best cuisines in the world for 2022 - preceded by Italy, Greece, Spain and Japan. But across the globe, Indian food is still synonymous with North Indian and Punjabi. Hence, it comes as no surprise that dishes like roti, naan, paneer tikka and butter chicken have been mentioned as the most popular. Much of this reputation, as we all know, has been created by Bangladeshi and Pakistani restaurants in the United Kingdom masquerading as “Indian.” The famous Bengali litterateur Buddhadev Bose had written a masterly treatise on Bengali Food which opened with his devastating experience of an “Indian Meal” in a small university town in midwest America.
Surely a time will come soon, when food from other regions of India will find its way into restaurant menus abroad as happened, for example, with ethnic Chinese cuisines like Sichuan, Hunan and Cantonese. Some signs are already visible with chains like Saravana Bhavan going west. Recently, Anjan Chatterjee of Oh Calcutta fame has opened Chourangi, a high-end fine dining restaurant in London that serves nouvelle Bengali cuisine.
Ultimately it all boils down to economics. As India prospers as a business and tourist destination there will be greater awareness about Indian food. The pan-Indian diaspora gaining social and financial clout will create a market for ethnic food abroad.
(Sandip Ghose is a current affairs commentator.)