Good Food Good Living

By Karen Anand

What are the best foods to try in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur? How do you judge wines and pair them with Indian foods? What would you order in Paris if you were a vegetarian? And which cheeses would you shop for abroad if you were carrying home a hamper? These are among the many foodie questions answered by Karen Anand in her collection of food writings published over the years and compiled in this informative book. Savour the flavours from around the world and catch up on global food trends. Also enjoy the special collection of recipes from different corners of the world woven into the articles.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Collins India
• Release date: Aug 18, 2011
• ISBN: 9789350293003

Karen Anand

Karen Anand is a food consultant, writer and businesswoman. Her career in food includes a successful catering company, Mumbai's first gourmet food shop, a gourmet academy, and the 'Karen Anand' brand of food products. She has contributed food columns to the Times of India, Elle, Mint, Man's World, Verve and Pune Times. Karen has several cookery books and three successful food shows (on Star World, CNBC and Star One) under her belt, and was recently awarded the prestigious Food & Spirit Award by the French government for her work in promoting French food and wine. She also authors the yearly Pune city Times Food Guide

Book preview

Good Food Good Living

KARAN ANAND

An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers

I’d like to dedicate this book to my mother Ophelia

who sent me on my first trip abroad at the age of 10…

and I’ve had itchy feet ever since.

Contents

Introduction

Paris, City of Feasts

A Toast to Wine

Wine FAQs

An Oil to Soothe the Soul

Flavoured Right, but Naturally

Fruitful Fancies

If You Knew Sushi Like I Did…

Keep Them Fresh and Cheesy

Land of Milk and Money

Light Is Right

Even the French Eat Vegetables

On the Lean Side

This Is Your (Barbe)Cue

They Eat Crabs, Don’t They?

Seafood in the Rains

Food to Warm the Soul

Caviar Secrets

You Say Tomato, I Say Vaishali

Flavours Exotica

Sweet and Sour City

The Pulse of Life

A Bite of the Best

Tapas Time

Food Sense and Sensibilities

Kobe or Not Kobe

Focus on Foie Gras

The Cup that Cheers

A Wine-tasting Jamboree

Soup for All Seasons

Cuisine of the Southern Sun

Doin’ It Slow

Not Just Satays and Spice

Secrets of the Seven Flavours

Quite Simply Singapore!

Thai and I

Pasta Perfect

My Last Supper

Copyright Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements

Index

Introduction

People always ask me, ‘Did you always love cooking?’ My reply to that is the Jewish princess joke:

‘What does the Jewish princess do when she’s hungry?’

‘Make a reservation.’

And that’s what I did until I was about 18 (though I’m neither Jewish nor a princess). So, yes, I love to cook … sometimes. More importantly, I love discovering the stories behind a recipe, the history and the health angle. Then, based on what I’ve observed or read, I re-create a dish, often with a twist or an improvisation with local ingredients. That’s what I do well and I do it without being in the kitchen for hours. I am not a chef. I can’t replicate immaculately conceived recipes day after day, night after night. And because I don’t do that and I don’t have stringent restaurant deadlines and pressures, I have fun doing what I do.

So what do I actually do? Well, I help create flavours for companies like Pepsi, and I promote wines and orchestrate wine dinners for people like Good Earth Winery. I set up experience centres for Miele Appliances. I am a general resource and food consultant to restaurants like Dishoom in London, Zune at the Hilton in Delhi and the upcoming Pesto Pesto in Pune. It’s hugely satisfying to be part of success stories such as these. And I write, mainly columns, articles and a few books – about restaurants, recipes and mainly food and travel.

I love what I do, even when it is fraught with challenges, deadlines and difficult people. More than anything else, I am a traveler, constantly trying the new, the unexpected and sometimes the predictable things too. I enjoy being with people who cook and enjoy food, as they are generally an honest, salt of the earth bunch. Then I write down all my experiences – a process I always look forward to because for days on end, I don’t have to worry about waxing my legs, plucking my eyebrows or going to the hairdresser. That’s bliss.

Life can be tough. If my writing can transport someone to an exotic place or evoke a distant memory, then I’ve done my job.

Paris, City of Feasts

In the month of August I usually make my annual pilgrimage to the gourmet capital of Western civilization – Paris. My ties with this city have all the elements of a sustained love affair. It is a passionate tale of nearly 20 years of deep friendship, physical longing and abiding affection, with more delicious food discoveries and shared pleasures of the table than most people can hope for in a lifetime. It is not, for me, a city of fancy restaurants with fancy prices. It is the smell of Gauloises and black coffee at dawn, of crepes with Grand Marnier on a street corner, of paté and plonk on the Seine, of sturdy tossed salads with robust mustardy dressings in a café, of just-baked Quiche Lorraine from the most ordinary bakery, of oysters and Muscadet on a rainy day. It is a lusty, joyous journey and I can’t resist sharing some of it.

This is a city where passion overtakes reality, especially in the realm of food. It is not just the food itself but the stories that accompany them – what happened on the way to the wine shop, where you find a particular cheese, how long you had to queue for bread at Poilane, the black cherries you spotted on the way home. It isn’t romantic in any obvious sort of way. It is the spirit and vitality of the food that transforms an ordinary dinner into a memorable evening with soul warming fare, the glow of good company and an easy ambience that’s romantic in a raffish sort of way.

Despite the fact that pinball machines have invaded some of my favourite cafés, that supermarkets are taking the place of the corner grocery store and that the wretched McDonald’s seems to be replacing all that was old and quaint, I still find that for every loss, there is a rebirth. Paris as a city is about as food-obsessed as you can get. You can barely take a step or a breath, without sights, sounds or gastronomically rich aromas coming at you from at least one direction. The Parisian face is the Western world’s answer to a morning meditation centre, where you can have a coffee standing at the bar, or sit and watch the world go by without any risk of the ritual being interrupted.

The second-most meditative and inspiring place to be is the market. Each arrondissement or neighbourhood is like a little village usually with a permanent indoor market as well as street markets. I used to go to the one spread along the Boulevard Edgar Quinet in the 14th or Boulevard Raspail, which were a stone’s throw from where I lived. In addition to the availability of fresh vegetables, fruit and dairy products, an organic section has now cropped up in response to the growing demand for healthy, vegetarian options. On one of my recent trips, I discovered the markets of Rue de Levis and Rue Poncelet in the 17th, which both have excellent bakeries and cheese shops nearby. These are places in which Parisians return to their primal form. They remember that other people exist, they wish passersby, they are friendly and concerned to the point of distraction. Alleosse, who owns one of the city’s best cheese shops on the Rue Poncelet, makes it a point to acquaint me with all his new finds every time I visit, even if it means leaving a customer to make a trip down to his cellars.

On each trip to Paris, I cook an almost ritualistic dinner for some old friends. It is like watching a re-run of an old movie; only the actors, almost always the same, get older. The menu traditionally cannot be changed either. Quiche Lorraine or Onion Tart; a salad consisting of several types of green leaves and red chicory, usually with some goat’s cheese thrown in, all tossed in a dressing of roughly cut shallots, mustard (Amora Dijon mustard always does the job well) and red wine vinegar; shoulder of lamb with preserved garlic; very thin green beans and Pommes Dauphinoises (thinly sliced potatoes baked with garlic and cream); lots of excellent Burgundy which by tradition is bought by my hostess; and a tangy lemon tart, which I don’t make but buy from a patisserie called, appropriately, Passion. A plateau of a few well-chosen cheeses, usually from Alleosse, completes the ceremony.

The evening is always a nostalgic hit. There is always someone finishing off what remains of the cheese in the kitchen, while someone else clears up the dishes. Others discuss their private lives and personal fantasies while putting the last drops of wine to rest.

I visit a great many elegant restaurants serving French food in the course of my travels, but never do I enjoy French food as much as I do on this particular day each year. For the last eight or nine years, I have shifted allegiance from the old butcher (now retired) off the Rue de Rennes, who used to personally cut the meat according to the dish you were preparing, to a butcher on the Rue de Buci, another rambling market area near the Odeon. When I tell him that a traditional French roast lamb is on the menu, he selects the shoulder or leg from a two-year-old animal. If the animal is older, the meat will be tough and if it is younger, it will be tasteless. He prepares it himself by removing all the unnecessary fat, but leaving just enough to produce a jus.

All this may sound excessive, but believe me, in France it is considered perfectly reasonable for a dry cleaner to point out a red wine stain on a shirt, ask you which wine it was and then start an animated discussion on the meal itself. Even as students in Paris, I can never remember anyone rushing out for a hamburger or a pizza. Dinners were always communal, enjoyable affairs where everyone helped to produce the meal, especially the men, and spent the rest of the evening talking about it.

I confess to a weakness for the old and traditional, whether it is food or furnishings. There are certain familiar dishes that have stood the test of time in Paris and can hardly be improved upon. So when you visit, forget the Eiffel Tower and elegant restaurants, and instead discover the soul of the city through its bakeries, markets, wine shops and bistros. This is where you’ll find the real passion that Paris is famous for.

A Toast to Wine

Some time ago, we escaped to Panchgani for a quiet little weekend with friends. There is little one can do at this hill resort except eat, sleep and drink, with the odd stroll in between to prepare oneself for the next gastronomic onslaught. One of the evenings was devoted to a dinner with the local residents. Our charming hostess, the principal of a school in the area, laid out a gourmet feast incorporating seasonal fruits and vegetables. Knowing this was going to be a special dinner, one of our friends brought along a bottle of French red table wine bottled by the ubiquitous Calvet. Considered a very average table wine in its native France, this is a favourite at the duty-free shops. Our friend had bought it from a local bootlegger in Mumbai for a pretty sum.

Once opened, the nectar was enthusiastically imbibed by the hill resort brigade – more, I suspect, because of the fancy French label, than their love of good wine. I managed to sneak a sip somewhere towards the end of the bottle, amidst much oohing and aahing, and discovered, to my horror, that the contents were about as French as my left toe. First of all, the colour was a murky, reddish mauve and the bouquet was decidedly sweet, mid-syrupy. There was no doubt about it – this was good old Indian ‘port wine’ all the way. We inspected the bottle. The cork was obviously an old one, but the red metal paper on top looked brand new. What it taught us, apart from the need to be more careful about sharp talking bootleggers, is how little we know or care about what we drink or eat, and how easily we get taken in by foreign names and fancy packaging.

Part of an alien culture, wine is undoubtedly a luxury in India. But the same applies to whisky and, to a lesser extent, beer – and we produce and consume plenty of both. I spoke to the great wine expert and publisher/editor of The Wine Review, Ch’ng Poh Tiong, in Singapore. Amazingly unpretentious, he talked about wine with Asian food like a couple that was meant to be. ‘Wine is not a European drink; in fact, the earliest record of winemaking is in the Old Testament. The first thing that Noah did when he came out of the ark was to plant a vine. There are also early references to wine in the Middle East, Greece and Rome,’ he stated matter-of-factly. ‘Beer was discovered about 5,000 years ago in Sumeria, again nowhere near Europe, and alcohol is actually an Arabic word.’

All this information got me thinking. Why are we Indians so uneducated about the culture of wine? I know many people who boast that they can blind-taste several well-known brands of Scotch. I know educated gin and vodka drinkers and those who swear by beer with their meals. But wine connoisseurs are few and far between. The only reason I can think of is lack of information and lack of the brew, as it were. The other factor influencing our reluctance to drink wine is the high price. However, this is a chicken-and-egg situation. When you talk to wine producers, they all say that the demand in this country is too low