At last, we are getting real food, sourced from our own environment.
IT IS funny how food trends change every decade or so. In the ’70s, the nouvelle cuisine movement was at its height in Europe and chefs were throwing out their flour-thickened sauces and focusing on fresh flavours.In those days, the chef was supposed to go to the market every day, buy whatever was fresh and seasonal and then come back to the kitchen to find interesting ways of cooking the produce.
By the late ’80s, improvements in transportation and the slow advent of globalisation began to change all that. Chefs stopped going to markets and worried less and less about local ingredients. They dealt instead with vast networks of global suppliers who were able to make any ingredient available at any time of year.
Did the chef feel like asparagus in November when the season was over? No worries. The supplier knew somebody in Peru who grew large (if mostly tasteless) asparagus spears and would happily fly them thousands of miles across the world. Scallops in warm-water countries? Sure. Frozen North Atlantic scallops that looked right (even if they tasted all wrong) were available all year round.
For us in the Third World, globalisation came as a boom and a curse. I remember Indian chefs, in the ’80s, struggling to adapt local ingredients for Western dishes. At the Mumbai Taj, they had trouble importing mozzarella. So they found an expat at the Rajneesh ashram in Pune who made his own. Because there were no fish imports, enterprising chefs would trek to the nearby Sassoon Docks to see what the fishermen had caught.
Denne historien er fra February 19, 2017-utgaven av Brunch.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra February 19, 2017-utgaven av Brunch.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
Let's tri all the angles
BFFs falling for the same girl, kidnap twists, murders, bromances. These 10 three-way love stories play with geometry and our feelings
Should you Q up for this?
Audi's luxury SUV, the Q8, has had a refresh. But a sleeker grille and headlight tech don't make up for what's still missing
How to plan a great escape
It's getting colder. It's already hard to breathe. Why not plan a winter vacation that's a world away but not too far away?
Kababs, yes, but khandvi too
Mughlai cuisine has as many vegetarian dishes as meaty ones. A new translation of a 16th century manuscript shows how we ate, and why modern labels are pointless
I can be your hero
Gurfateh Pirzada, only afewroles old, is the green flag we didn't know we needed. He's learning from women. He wants to be more thana lover and a fighter. He's hoping we all do better. No wonder everyone's crushing on him
Meet the export experts
Khadi crop-tops in Spain, faux-leather hoodies in London, fairytale wedding gowns in the UAE. See how some desi labels are killing it on foreign shores
Why we're all feeling Blue
Coco Mellors's new novel is about grief, sisterhood, and of course, addiction and unlikeable women. How does she make it work?
This week, we're...
Changing the momo game, listening to kids, starting a new business, and supporting pro waxxers
Rohit Chawla
Photographer, artist, @RohitChawlaPhotography_
Congratulations, it's a goal
Lakeside vows, pastel palettes, bayous, backyards and boats. These celeb weddings are what modern fairytales are made of