JOIN USBook of lockdown recipes
Chef Abraham Jacob aka chef Abe has used the lockdown period to explore his creative side.
The co-founder of Recode Hospitality has not only created two digital characters — Ansarai Bhai and Micheal — he’s also working on releasing a book with the collection of recipes he’s made before and during the lockdown period.
Talking to Metrolife, the chef says, “Having grown up in Frazer Town all my life, I’ve picked up the dialects and accents from the Muslim community. That’s where Ansari Bhai’s cooking tutorial on Dakhini recipes and Micheal’s walk-through of old Bangalore food as told from an Anglo-Indian’s perspective is inspired from.”
He has named the segments ‘Cookurry ke do baathe, Ansari ke saathe’ and ‘Micheal-oh bleddy ‘ell’. These characters, he feels, help share his love for food in a light-hearted manner, something that is needed at a time like this.
Chef Abe has different intentions with these characters. “Ansari is meant to talk in a particular dialect because it’s so relatable to the city,” he says. Micheal highlights the number of Anglo Indians that are in the city and the significance of some of the iconic restaurants and food in the city from a special at Nagarjuna to the famous RR Restaurant food.
Currently, he is compiling everything he has experimented with over the years and the last couple of months. Working with a team to help him design this, he says, has been a creative journey.
He says, “The book is going to have 200 recipes and the images are going to be more of a concept than the final image of the dish. So if it’s a pizza, it’ll have a circle with maybe some ingredients around it. The whole idea of the book is to revolve around the concept rather than what we are used to seeing otherwise.”
Chef Abe hopes to bring out the book in September, just in time to celebrate his 50th birthday.