Tales of Spice and Curry

It is not often that one meets a chef and food writer who is an ex British RAF pilot, a stage lighting specialist an an expert on all things curry. But then again Pat Chapman is not your regular bloke. This bright-eyed 64-year-old has visited India 44 times and his personal roots lie firmly intertwined with the history of India. It is not much of a surprise that Chapman carries the sobriquet of Curry King confidently and is as eloquent with his knowledge of the different masalas and spices as he is deft with preparing dishes based on andaaz. Recently in town for a special demonstration on marinades and grills, Pat Chapman held forth on what curry meant for the British people and how he has in his own way tried to popularize the concept without owning a restaurant, or manufacturing ready-to-eat TV dinners a la Sir Noon to the populace, thus making it nearly as ubiquitous as the neighbourhood fish and chips in 21st century UK.

According to old family records and his grandmother's stories, Pat Chapman can trace his history right back to the first British presence in the country. In a tale that reads straight out of a great East-West novel, Chapman's great great great grandfather came to India with the East India Company merchants way back in 1715. Not too much is known of this period and it is only in the the mid-19th century that the trail picks up again with his great grandfather who was enlisted in the British army and was living in India with his wife and infant daughter. As the tide of favour turned against the ruling powers and found expression in the 1857 Sepoy Mutiny, great violence ensued throughout the country. Chapman's great-grandfather and his wife were killed and the little daughter ended up as the sole survivor of the family. Although she was raised in England, the moment she came of age, she returned to India to study at the St Joseph's College, Nainital and lived here till things got unpleasant for the Raj. Her daughter, Patrick's mother was also born in Nainital. When his grandmother did return to England, she carried with as a legacy, a wealth of culinary knowledge from the country. And it was this legacy that she passed on to her grandson Patrick.

Patrick grew up eating Indian food at a time when it was a rare thing in England. "I remember in those days there were 6 Indian restaurants in all of Britain while today, there are over 9000. Things are very different now and everything is available in your local mom n pop store. When I was young, I remember my grandmother ordering spices from the chemist as that was the only chance of getting a hold of them," says Chapman.

Growing up in the wake of a post World War II England, Patrick developed an interest in curry as a hobby. Since he had grown up eating Indian food, he decided to take his interest and knowledge a step forward by helping out friends, colleagues and acquaintances with recipes and information about spices. In keeping with this, he founded the Curry Club, an offline social network (this was 1982) to disseminate information about Indian curries. This hobby expanded into a full-time profession and very soon, Chapman was a consultant, cookery show host and food writer with his recipes and knowledge about Indian food making him a much coveted expert in the field. It is thus quite apt that Pat Chapman was in fact invited by the Kerala government to give a talk on spices at an agricultural fair.

According to Chapman, the term 'curry' which has been appropriated into the British culinary vocabulary today, is a word that is unmatched by anything else from another geography or another cuisine. "The word curry describes a dish, a meal and the food of a nation and I don't think that there is anything quite like it," says Pat Chapman. Chapman who travels across Britain giving cooking demonstrations and teaches amateur as well as first-time cooks the nuances of spices, encouraging them to move beyond the Chicken Tikka Masala and its clones realizes that the diversity of Indian food is far too great to be captured by curries alone. "Since the earliest settlers and consequently the earliest restaurants in England were the Punjabis, that is also the Indian food which has remained most popular in the nation. Today, we have broken away from the stereotypical pastiche of Indian food that used to dot every menu in London. Chefs are introducing regional cuisine as well as fusion," says Chapman even though he remains a purist who loves the authentic and often fiery nature of curry rather than hybrid versions of the same.

Chapman stands as a beacon of Indian food in a foreign land helping make it global, accessible and giving it the recognition that it deserves. He is the undisputed curry king who loves his Goan Vindaloo which he believes gets its right flavour only with the hard-to-get toddy vinegar and the high levels of heat that might make most people squirm, but rests easy in the belly of the 'Curry King' .

(this was published in the New Indian Express, Bangalore on 1 November 2014)

the young and restless clothes maiden

It was a bright Saturday morning, the kind of day you'd imagine that pretty young things would be lunching with friends or sunning themselves at the park, instead, here they were at a mall, standing in a serpentine queue (at a quick count I estimated nearly 150 people standing in line) for a chance to catch the opening of the much-awaited affordable and trendy high-street fashion store--Forever 21.

On the selfsame Saturday afternoon, the borderline decrepit Garuda Mall in Bangalore was dotted with young girls and well preserved older women carrying the huge signature bright-yellow shopping bags. Some, barely able to contain their excitement had upended their bags on the benches outside the store and were comparing notes about their loot with friends.

The queue that I contemplated standing in for precisely two seconds, was full of young girls 21 and younger, dressed in their fashionable best with candy coloured lips and skinny jeans in pop colours. Pop and indie dance music boomed from the interiors of the store (special note must be made of Sia's Chandelier which has lodged itself in my head as a permanent earworm), keeping spirits buoyant. The girls (they were all women in all their late teen and early twenties, wit blazing hormones and dapper spirits. A few male stragglers stood around shuffling uncomfortably, no doubt waiting to surprise their girlfriends and win a few brownie points), stodd patiently conserving their energy reserves like sprinters waiting to take their turns at athletic heats.

The atmosphere was charged as the security guards would remove the ropes guarding the entrance and let the next group in. All around me I could here whispered asides about the fashion and affordability quotient of the brand that was enough to send young'uns into a tizzy. I shamelessly eavesdropped as one girl recounted stories of a sale at another Forever 21. There was jostling and pushing, tugging at errant arms and legs of the same pair of jeans and tops, and jackets and even shoes sent flying by the fashion marauders. This was a whole new retail experience, slightly surreal and entirely exciting.

 I was hardly a callow young girl and had few pretensions of being forever 21 in any part of my body apart from my head. Yet, even I wasn't immune to the attraction of this store, counting down the days till its opening. While, I made it a point to shop it big brands only during the sale season, this store offered stylish alternatives of the same outfits at full price that were otherwise available on some lucky days on some backstreet alley export rejects store. While, out of respect for my age, I didn't stand in the queue and returned in the evening, I also did get my Forever 21 fix on the very first day that it opened.

By the time I returned to the store, the staff was seemingly on their last legs. There were mountains of tried and discarded outfits just about everywhere. The brave would stick their arms in and pull out gems fro those selfsame pile, while a more lazy shopper like me dawdled through the stands of the sprawling 8000 sq feet of neon-lit space and picked up bits and bobs in various shades of black that suited my age and body type. Showcasing their winter line, the orderly display had, by 9 pm, turned into one large blur of plaid minis, woolly shrugs, faux leather jackets, trendy tan-coloured workman boots and distressed denims. It was also populated with dazed boyfriends, tired mothers and giggly girls whose energy had not waned in the least after standing in lines for the changing room, lines for bills and lines to reach particular stands.

As I managed to grab my purchases and make my way to the billing counter without losing either limb or life, I spotted a pile of ankle socks with little pugs, kitties and lions going rrrr and realized that it is perhaps this quirky take on style that makes every shopper here truly feel the lightness of youth!

(this was published in the New Indian Express, Bangalore on 24 November 2014)