Indian, or rather, Indian-inspired food is everywhere. | Photo: Getty Images/ iStock
“We’re taking you to an Indian restaurant!” As a frequent traveler to foreign shores, this is a sentence that jumps out at me with fascination and alarming frequency. It’s also the one I dread hearing the most.
I hear it from friends I’m visiting. I hear it from relatives whose houses I am crashing. I hear it from business associates I’m meeting with. Everyone automatically assumes that I, as a food and travel writer, must miss and love Indian food. So much so that I have to force feed myself the minute I get off.
While they seem to have got the ‘love’ part in place, the ‘miss’ part is pushing it. I mean, why would I be excited to eat ersatz, localized versions of some of Indian cuisine’s greatest hits when I can enjoy the infinitely better-executed originals at home? Please spare me those sad and sweet ‘chickens’ vindaloos (it’s always pork in the spicy Goan original) and the milder ones, replaced with spinach leaves’ sarson’ and saags.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t look forward to trying the various Indian-inspired, albeit entirely indigenous, preparations – local dishes with often vaguely Indian-based anyway the tastes.
Ali Islami and chicken tikka masala
Scotland-based Ali Ahmed Aslam is said to have invented the chicken tikka masala. As the UK’s de facto national dish that bears no relation to traditional Indian cuisine, it was created by Aslam in the early 70s at Shish Mahal, | Photo Credit: Courtesy Twitter.com
The recent death of Scottish-based Pakistani restaurateur Ali Ahmed Aslam has put the oft-debated chicken back in the spotlight tikka masala. As the UK’s de facto national dish that bears no relation to traditional Indian cuisine, it was created by Aslam in the early 70s at Shish Mahal, his (then) modest little curry house in Glasgow, Scotland. He came up with it by adding a creamy tomato-based sauce to some tandoori chicken tick the pieces that one diner complained were too dry and crumbly.
While on the subject of curry, whenever I find myself in Japan, I can’t resist the lure of a well-made one. in katsukare also known as katsu curry. It consists of a pig kitten named tonkatsu served with a portion of Japanese rice and topped with a thick, mild, sweet curry sauce. I soon learned that curry was introduced to Japan in the late 18th century, when the Indian subcontinent was under colonial rule by the British Empire. However, it wasn’t until the early 20th century, when curry was chosen by the Japanese Navy and Army to feed the troops, that the dish began to become popular with the regular Japanese people.
The popular dish of oxtail and peanut sauce do-do in the Philippines it is an homage to Indian curry. | Photo: Getty Images/ iStock
Interestingly, the curry-military connection is also something I came across recently when I visited the Philippines. The wildly popular oxtail and peanut sauce dish do-do is another tribute to our cock. It is believed that Indian exiles from South India who settled in the Philippines during the British occupation of Manila improvised their own cuisine with available materials. They originally called the dish kari-kaari which has now been transformed into do-do. And guess what it’s always served with? A delicious fruit and vegetable pickle simply named Atchara!
Puran poli, chole bhature and Malabar porotta too
And just like spices-bereft Atchara, another iteration of fruit-vegetable pickles emerges on the island of Mauritius, which is known for its considerable Indian demographic origins. Summoned atcharit’s the perfect spice to add to a serving puree doll. Known as the national street food of Mauritius and similar to a delicious version of the Maharashtrian dessert puran poly (and nothing like North Indian daal puri), this pancake-style bread, supposedly of Bihari origin, comes filled with split yellow peas that have been mixed and seasoned with turmeric and cumin. A kind of ubiquitous, on-the-go snack, you can find it for purchase on almost every street corner. Always served in pairs and topped with curry beans, atchar and different chutneys. A sweet counterpart of puree doll also used to collect the Mauritian version of kheer.
The double, which resembles the chole bhature of India, is a breakfast staple throughout Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean. | Photo: Edmund Gall/ flickr.com
Also served in pairs and hence its name, the ‘double’ is a breakfast staple throughout the twin island nation of Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean. It consists of two small pieces of fried flat dough called reed filled with roasted chickpeas, served topped with tamarind chutney and a super hot sauce made from Caribbean scotch peppers. The dish – which I felt was quite like ours chole bhature — was first established in Fairfield, Princes Town by Emamool Deen and his wife Rasulan in 1936. Interestingly, the name ‘double’ originated in 1937 when Deen’s customers insisted that he make their order of irresistible treatment a “double”.
There is another Indian-inspired dish with a rather unusual name and analogy in Trinidad and Tobago. A repeat of our Malabar bad, the bus closes it’s a flame foretold which is broken by the cook using their hands after frying in a pan. Thus, leaving the flatbread to resemble a torn or “cracked” shirt. The ribbon-like pieces, which they had me dip into a spicy chickpea and potato curry and eat with mango Trini-style… well, here we go again, açaar!
The Mumbai-based writer and restaurant reviewer is passionate about food, travel and luxury, not necessarily in that order.
