A palate for varied flavours

Bangaloreans have started exploring a lot of new cuisines and becoming both conscious and picky about dining options.

Metrolife speaks to food lovers in the City to understand more about this trend.
Vinesh Johny, a chef and baker, believes that the reason for people experimenting with cuisines is that there are people from different cultures in the City and many are travelling these days.

“People are finding out about different kinds of food, but don’t eat it. Everybody knows, for example, what a macaroon is and how it looks. But they’ve never really tried it. That’s why they’re all so open to culinary experiments,” says the man who started the baking institution called Lavonne.

Speaking on the authenticity of the food, he adds, “Most people who have started world cuisine restaurants, know what they’re doing and have been to the original country to bring its food here. Some try to make it a little Indian to get more takers. But now, that is also changing. People actually import ingredients to make the food eaten the way it is supposed to be.” There are some who believe that the culture of experimenting with different cuisines is so new that it is embarrassing.

“Half the techniques, flavours and ingredients, being used here under the ambit of ‘cutting edge’, are at least a few years old as far as the international food scene is concerned,” notes Padmavathy Krishna Kumar, a foodie-cum-chef.

“Most of these people are influenced by shows like ‘Top Chef’ and ‘MasterChef’ and there is an increasing demand for the food we see on TV, which did not exist 10 years ago,” she adds.

Regarding her personal taste, she says that she works with traditional recipes first and once she’s comfortable with them, she tries something different.

 “The important thing I try to remember is that trying something new doesn’t have to be completely outlandish or mind-blowing. You can base new dishes on old favourites, but make it look, taste and feel totally different.” Food writer Nandita Iyer has her own opinion on the matter.

 “After Indian food, Italian food seems to be the most loved cuisine — the carbohydrates, cheese and almost familiar vegetables used in pastas and of course, pizzas have been a favourite for a long time,” she says. She also points out that since people are already cooking a variety of Indian, Italian and Chinese dishes  at home, they want to try new stuff that they can’t make at home when dining out. “Things like sushi, grills
or other cuisines cannot be replicated at home for want of very speciality ingredients.

Now, there are restaurants serving Korean, Mexican, Vietnamese, Malaysian
and even Persian delicacies!”

Like Padmavathy, she agrees about the influence of food shows. “Shows like ‘Masterchef Australia’ and the umpteen international food shows on lifestyle channels are responsible for increasing awareness about different cuisines in the world, as well as in making people more openminded to try new stuff,” she concludes.