As far as luxury dining goes, there is little to beat the idea of a chef?s table. And while the concept is quite new to India, it is fast catching up with restaurants here
One of the most innovative meals that I have had this season?anywhere in the world?has been at the newly launched chef?s table at Indian Accent. Chef Manish Mehrotra, who heads the understated but extremely popular Delhi restaurant, is no doubt amongst the handful of chefs in the country who have garnered a cult following and, of course, the restaurant is the best example today of how contemporarised Indian cuisine can remain true to regional roots and yet be experimental and cutting-edge. But the chef?s table takes the experience even further.
As a concept, the chef?s table is rather new to India. The chef?s table at the Souk, with its cozy setting, view of the Mumbai harbour, a seven-course menu by chef Hemant Oberoi, Versace crockery and a matching price tag, was for long one of the most exclusive (not to mention priciest) dining experiences available at any Indian restaurant. More recently, we have examples from hotels like ITC Gardenia in Bangalore (Edo, the Japanese restaurant, has a multi-course Japanese Kaiseki meal) that started offering similar exclusive menus put together by master chefs, where the accent is on the chef personally interacting with guests besides the luxury tasting menu.
In the last one year, on the other hand, ?chef?s table? has become a much more loosely used term. A slew of restaurants now offer pricey prix fixe or degustation menus (paired with wine) in their private dining rooms. Sometimes these work, often they don?t. But all these are uniformly dubbed ?chef?s table?.
A real chef?s table, however, is much more than a tasting menu. And that is something we have not really seen often enough, clearly not enough in this country. But with Indian Accent this is changing. Considering that a customer is spending between R5,000-10,000 per head for a seat on this top table (depending on the menu, the wine and taxes in each state), it is high time that there be some clarity on what really is a chef?s table.
Given that the chef?s table as a concept first came up in Europe, where French chefs literally put tables in their kitchens to make interacting with family, friends and privileged guests easier while they worked, it should be easy enough to understand: one of the primary requirements of a chef?s table is that the table be literally in the kitchen. It is akin to getting the ultimate backstage pass to a prestigious event. You become the insider?a coveted label in the world of luxury?and can watch a celeb chef at work, take in the energy of the kitchen and so forth. High-end American restaurants that popularised this in the 1990s often played
on this idea.
Of course, in a country like India, where our kind of cooking involves long, hot hours of cooking, it is impossible to actually host a luxury experience inside messy hotel kitchens. But instead of hosting a chef?s table in a pretty private dining room, restaurants need to make an effort to actually showcase their kitchen dynamics. Indian Accent remains true to this concept through its uniquely designed space, where a kitchen window opens up into the dining room. Mehrotra stands at the window, finishing each dish in front of guests and talking about his ingredients, food philosophy and so on. We also get to see other chefs at work through the same window.
By its very definition, a chef?s table must be small (accommodating not more than eight or nine guests). But that sense of exclusivity must translate into the food as well. Instead of a common prix fixe menu that many restaurants offer, the menu for a chef?s table must be truly bespoke: the table needs to be booked in advance so that the chef is able to deliberate on what he will be cooking and take into account food preferences/suggestions from guests. The menu should not be a repeat of what is on the regular restaurant menu. And obviously, it needs to surprise or wow diners who are shelling out a bomb.
At Indian Accent, one of the dishes that I loved best was the pulled pork tacos. The tacos were made of tiny phulkas and each taco had a wedge of Benares aloo papad to give the crunch. This for me symbolised the best of contemporarised Indian: where quintessentially ?Indian tastes? are retained but the entire dish is elevated. The vegetarian version of the dish?pulled kathal taco is even more stunning; using a seasonal Indian veg that no restaurant dabbles in today. Similarly, creations such as keema-kaleji (with foie gras substituting for goat/chicken liver) and desserts with Phantom cigarettes (the candy that we all remember from our childhood) stand true to the chef?s kitchen philosophy of not just merging flavours, textures and techniques, but also of playing around with food as a function of memory; as something that evokes nostalgia and plays with emotions. In the end, that is exactly what a chef?s table menu should be able to do. Serve offerings so distinctive that they become part of your food memories.
The writer is a food critic