Culinary sustainability: ‘Rewoking’ the past

Chefs have a unique part to play in making the food system more environmentally sustainable, socially just, and delicious, writes Madhulika Dash

Asian spring rolls

Moringa Macha Mille Feuille

Chef Gresham Fernandes has just begun working on his new menu for Swine Dine. The debut success of this ‘nose-to-tail’ concept in Mumbai has given Impresario’s Culinary Director just the nudge to move ahead with a project that in the coming weeks will have Chef Gresham call it his “dream work.” Working through a small open kitchen where the sustainable chef creates a six-course meal, with each course “heroing” a certain part of the pig including the dessert, delving deep into his East Indian legacy of making the best of what’s available and ensuring zero wastage.

Far off in the old market lanes of Guwahati, another culinary explorer is digging his heels deep into not only understanding the nuances of Ahom cuisine but also the process of growing and foraging ingredients. Chef Anirban Dasgupta (now with JW Marriott) became the first to not only assemble spices into pan-Indian cuisine but set up a local shop in its all-day dining for regional specials, cooked by locals with produces sourced from locals.

Looking within

A “trend” that was spearheaded by Chef Sabyasachi Gorai, who with his various brands including the now-closed Lavaash and Bob’s Bar had already begun creating a matrix of not just local producers but traditional artisanal makers of cheese like Kalimpong, local olives, nolen gur and such. A pathway that the former Masque culinary head, Chef Prateek Sadhu too was taking to create his ingredients-based restaurant menu with produce sourced from places he had travelled including his hometown Kashmir. Touted as a culinary fad by many, for the culinary community this gradual graduation towards looking within soon transformed into their way of championing not just regional cuisine presented in modern couture, but also a way of wheeling towards the traditional way of growing and preserving produce that was, as Chef Gorai puts it, “better in their nutritive and taste value.”

A fact endorsed by Cal-Indo specialist and Michelin award winner Chef Srijith Gopinath of Ettan, who has been driving the “when in Rome eat (and cook) like Romans” philosophy as one of the influential ‘eco chefs’ in San Francisco.

Chef Gopinath, who has been a voracious advocate of regional cuisine, has through his deep understanding of the ancient Southern food culture, been able to not just create a space for Indian food and its balanced philosophy in the West, but also turn seasonal produce into popular culinary masterpieces since the past decade. The thing about cooking seasonal, says Chef Gopinath, “is that it is not only easy to work with but there is minimal wastage because every part of a produce — meat, fish, roots or greens — is primed to be had and can be used in a variety of ways.”

Nourishing & tasty

A practice that defined culinary evangelist Chef Sharad Dewan’s kitchen philosophy during his days in The Park Hotel and even today as the co-founder of Gourmet Design Company, where his creations are based on the Taste from Waste tradition of our yore. The thing about scraps, he says, “or at least what we consider to be scraps and discard is that they can be powerhouses not just of taste but nourishment as well. This is the reason they are such an integral part of the robust cuisine of old food cultures of West Bengal and Odisha, where they play the role of elevating the meal experience.” Chef Dewan has in fact been a champion, much like green soldier Chef Amey Marathe of exploring traditional ways to reduce food waste.

Another cause true to Chef Fernandes and Chef Gorai’s hearts who have often used most of the non-restaurant ingredients in their staff meal as an attempt not only to educate young minds about the world of food and sustainable practices but also to create a repository of dishes that can help revive the idea of eating food in their entirety.

Yet another endeavour that plays on the well-studied aspect of food as medicine is Aujasya by The Leela which has taken cues from slow food advocate Chef Abhishek Gupta of The Leela Ambience Gurugram’s Epic Table — a platform that revived regional ingredients onto the popular dining scape — in collaboration with nutritionists to create a repertoire of food that not only uses food as the finest antidote to physical and mental wellbeing but in doing so, encourages farmers and local producers to adopt the traditional methodology of food production, and preservation.

A hearty collaboration

A cause that has been championed by both Chef Seth and Chef Saha who have been working with farmers around Bengaluru to create menus that both indulge and educate. In fact, for Chef Seth, the constant drive to collaborate with farmers, the fishermen community, animal breeders and food innovators who have made hydroponics and aeroponics, a widely accepted model, is an attempt to showcase not just how well local produce ingredients work with a variety of cuisine, including Mexican, but also revive produce like jackfruit, millet, mushroom, and tubers like yam by presenting it in different formats. The culinary flexitarian approach has recently been an ace for many younger chefs to bring more regional influences and techniques to their offerings. Be it Chef Pawan Bisht using spices and herbs from Uttarakhand in his dishes or Chef Dhruv Oberoi of Olive, who has taken Chef Bhatia’s legacy of using local produce in global cuisine with his new tasting platform Chefs’ Play. An excellent example of this would be his desserts like the Moringa Macha Mille Feuille. His version of this French dessert not only revisits the caramelising technique of Palakari but the dressing is a take on popular Indian ingredients like the macha Chantilly that uses dried moringa leaves in it, yuzu curd that he likes to alternate with Gondhoraj lemon zest and sake ice cream that he recently changed to palm nectar, an ode, he says, “to the eastern tradition of using palm toddy and ripened palm pulp.”

The need for making the switch

According to a recent UN report, more than 820 people in the world go hungry. Put that next to our current population of 7.6 million and it is one of every nine individuals going without food every day. Another report states that around 4.5 billion children, women and men live without safely managed sanitation services. An FAO count says about 149 million children under the age of 5 were stunted, 49 million wasted and 40 million overweight — and India’s share is a worrisome 14.5%. The global food production is 1.5 times more and can feed 10 billion. And yet a study in bioscience predicts an uncompromising increase of agricultural produce between 25-70 percent to feed the population.

According to an FAO study, of the 13.2 billion ha we have, 12 percent (1.6 billion ha) is currently in use for cultivation of agricultural crops, 28 percent (3.7 billion ha) is under forest, and 35 percent (4.6 billion ha) comprises grasslands and woodland ecosystems. According to a 2015 National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO) report, it is at 95 million hectares of land, which is lower than a previous study that put it at 159.6 million hectares. Add to this the current scenario, where due to climate change, the world — including India — today faces a wheat crisis, a staple that took precedence over rice because of its less demand on water and land. In fact, the rise in heat, as per environmentalists, has not only affected mangoes this season which has seen the lowest quality produce in a decade but is also set to affect the otherwise drought-resistant crop with jackfruit and yam being the next big hit.