New Delhi: On International Chef’s Day, Akhilesh Pathak, Chef De Cuisine at DoubleTree by Hilton Goa – Panaji who has an expertise in Kashmiri, Nawabi and Awadhi cuisine shares the finest details on how to curate dishes of this less explored cuisine in India.
Kashmiri or Wazwan (a multi-course meal popular throughout Kashmir) cuisine is an art of cooking to a very high degree of sophistication and quite distinct from that of any part of the world. This cuisine is further bifurcated into two sub-cuisines that of the Kashmiri Pandits and of the Muslims. Kashmiri Pandits food does not consist of onions, garlic and they rather use the mildly pungent Kashmiri red chili powder as a spice, as well as to impart colour to certain dishes without turning the food to become too spicy. In Muslim cuisine, the use of spices is lesser as compared to that in Pandit dishes, wherein they use onions and garlic and chilies are used in moderate quantity.
To please both palates Chef Ahkilesh came up with Gucchi Yakhani Dish.
An interesting fact about morel mushrooms is that it pops up at places, which are struck by lightning. Thus, it makes it very difficult to grow for commercial purposes and is generally found in the high altitude meadows and mountain ranges. Due to these reasons, it is very expensive.
Nawabi Cuisine
Back in the days and as per popular culture, it has been mentioned that each chef had his own secret recipe, which he used to impress the nawabs in exchange of personal favours. They neither shared the recipe with anyone nor passed it down to their descendants. Hence, many dishes died with them. Due to their intricacies and the whim of nawabs, many chefs were given honours and titles as reward.
Since the Nawabs love the beetle leaves and it being a great digestive ingredient, Chef Akhilesh came up with the Murgh Paan Kebab - a succulent chicken preparation stuffed with beetle leaves. So is the popularity, that this particular dish is a popular choice among the guests at the hotel’s all-day dining outlet ‘Comida’.
