One hundred years ago, when the British shifted their imperial capital from Kolkata to Delhi, the somewhat provincial town of undivided Punjab sprang to life, once more. But despite the coronation of a newer, more glamorous, and yes, powerful Delhi, the Dilli Darbar held in the same year?when members of all princely states congregated to pay obeisance to their British monarch?was an unrivalled display of Colonial power at its zenith.
However, the city, per se, was no stranger to political might and glory. For while the Raj was now headquartered in its new capital, the capital itself had seen more than its share of rajas; rulers dating back to medieval, and some would suggest, even ancient, puranic times. One result of Delhi?s continuous tryst with political power has, of course, been its cosmopolitanism?the way its cuisine has developed, borrowed from diverse traditions, is symptomatic of precisely such a culture, where the outsiders have become insiders; their language, attire, customs and food were incorporated into popular traditions, giving rise to a unique and distinct fabric of the city. When people say, Delhi has ?no culture?, it is ironic and untrue. There is no place on this planet without its own culture! Instead, Delhi?s culture and cuisine have never remained static; something that we continue to witness even today.
The first few years of the 20th century were no doubt monumental for Delhi as they were for the world, but in more ways than one. Apart from the rapidly changing political situation, this was a time for great mobility and the new imperial capital beckoned all kinds of people to its fold, even much before the partition.
In the world of food, these years saw the coming of age of a restaurant tradition in the city. A shift from a world that had hitherto relied on its street eats?khomchewallas and kebabchis, selling chaats and meat in the old city of Shahjahanabad, for evening entertainment. Haji Karimuddin, a poor immigrant, was to begin selling meat curry from a cart near Jama Masjid, just as the new capital was coming up outside the walled city, paving way for what is now known as Karim?s Hotel, as the legend now goes. And the subsequent years saw some enterprising Punjabi entrepreneurs setting up the equivalent of cafes in the poshest part of the new city made by Lutyens?Connaught Place?in the run up to the Partition.
As I sit at the United Coffee House (UCH), celebrating 70 years of existence, in Connaught Place, it is with a sense of history. The d?cor has remained unchanged, Punjabi-Victorian, if you like, with an opulent chandelier, and a balcony, from where as the stories suggest, prospective brides could be conveniently ?viewed? by the groom?s family in the 1950s-60s.
But it is not just the ambience that throws you back into another era. The menu does pretty much the same with some of the specials retaining their place more than half a century later, as a young Akash Kalra, third-generation owner tells me. Since, typically, there was no concept of eating out main meals at that time (though there was a tradition of eating chaat, samosas and kebabs in the evenings from the street stalls), places like UCH and Kwality (another old Connaught Place institution) were essentially cafes.
The elite new diners, who eschewed the evening street eats in Chandni Chowk, Daryaganj and other old Delhi localities, thought nothing of having their coffee with their keema samosas (researcher Salma Husain tells me samosas were a favourite with the Mughal emperors, with egg and fish being popular fillings apart from potatoes), cutlets and pineapple pastries. This became the trendy food of Delhi then, even as the old snacks of Shahjahanabad?bedmi-aloo, kulle, tikiya and kalmi bade and shami kebab, gole kebab or kali mirch tikka sold by various kebabchis in the walled city started taking a backseat.
By the time India became independent and Moti Mahal had famously come up in Daryaganj?to provide full fledged meals, claiming to invent the butter chicken in the process?the whole character of Delhi food had undergone a rapid change. The tandoor had introduced Dilliwallahs to delights that they could not cook at home. The original communities of Delhi, including the high-caste Hindu Kayasthas, and Baniyas preferred eating in to eating out given the strict caste rules that defined preparation and consumption of food. And the rich Mughal gravies were best prepared at home under the supervision of deft cooks, though there were a handful of shops selling nihari, mutton-and-potato curry, keema and kebabs. But the tandoor introduced Delhiites to lighter preparations, cooked fresh and thus more hygienic and their popularity may have been something akin to the popularity of open kitchens today! While Moti Mahal may claim to be the inventor of butter chicken, tandoori chicken had already come to Delhi by the time the restaurant sprang up.
As the culture of eating out began to define the capital of a newly-independent India, the erstwhile cafes started their own dinner menus, developing in the process, the prototype for all restaurant food in India for decades to come. In fact, it is this mix of Punjabi tandoori and generic Mughalai gravies that we are battling till today in restaurant formats. How these gravies came into existence in their bastardised forms will make for an interesting subject of culinary research no doubt, but it is conjectured that as cooks from all over moved to the new capital, where eating out was proving to be a thriving business, they brought with them traditional recipes that were then ?tweaked? to make these conducive to restaurant cooking.
In the process, slow cooking was lost, newer tastes catering to the newer eating out segment incorporated tomatoes and made foods much richer (butter, cream) to woo newer patrons. It is possible that the likes of Nargisi kofte (mince wrapped around a boiled egg, dropped in gravy) travelled from Avadh to Delhi in this way, to become a fixture in Mughalai-Punjabi menus like that at the UCH, where some Peshawari specials were tweaked and incorporated, or that the mutton pasanda, a delicacy of the Mughal and Kayastha homes, took a turn for the worse in tomatoey paneer and chicken version!
There was, of course, another kind of fusion food that was gaining ground in the new restaurants. The imperial connection meant that ?continental? food was in high demand and this would usually mean bread and cutlets or dishes like chicken a la Kiev or stragonoff that we look back on with nostalgia today. In fact, Kiev, despite its Ukranian name, was possibly a made-up dish?but not made up by Indian restaurants. Instead, according to various accounts, it saw its hey days in the ?50s and ?60s from New York to Paris, and was possibly a touristy French invention. But the breaded cutlet oozing with butter found favour with the Punjabi eating out populace of New Delhi and these are the dishes that evoke the nostalgia of the colonial era, along with strangely enough French onion soup and veg au gratin?both were still to be found on the menu at Kwality restaurant till some years ago.
On the other hand, the culture and cuisine of the older city of Shahjahanabad had all but disappeared; the most visible change coming by way of chole-bhature replacing bedmi-aloo as the popular snack of the city. In the years to come, this would get replaced by chowmein, pasta and sushi as the city continues to make outside influences its own. But luckily, a hundred years hence, efforts are also on to reclaim some of Delhi?s past.
The writer is a food critic