House of the rising son

Restaurateur Zorawar Kalra didn't follow in his father's footsteps but he has created a legacy that Jiggs Kalra would be proud of

- VIR SANGHVI

Now that he has been a judge on the Indian MasterChef and has danced on Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa, Zorawar Kalra is one of India's better known food figures.

The television fame distracts from his achievements as a restaurateur: Masala Library just celebrated its 10th anniversary. But more significantly, Kalra is the man who made Indian food cool for a new generation of diners who had come to associate Indian food (especially North Indian dishes) with boring restaurants that served butter chicken and dal makhani.

What's more, he did it by himself. He is not from a business family. He had no real capital to begin with. And he had never worked in a kitchen, let alone a restaurant.

The only advantage Kalra had was that his father was Jiggs Kalra, the former journalist who had a huge influence on the Indian food scene. Jiggs was one of the first people (along with the late Busybee) to write about food, first in Mumbai for the Times group and then in Delhi for the HT group.

Jiggs made two great contributions to Indian food. He toured the country and discovered people such as Lucknow's Tunday Kababwala. Many now-famous cooks and chefs owe their national fame to Jiggs's championship of their food. Secondly, he took real Indian food to hotels, which had been content with serving catering college-influenced approximations.

But Jiggs fell out with many of the chefs he had once been friends with. He gave ideas away for free and rarely made much money.