OVEN FRESH

Smoked meat freshly picked from a Japanese robata grill is tossed into a wooden bowl with fiery Sichuan peppers. The chef sticks a tiny yellow nametag to the bowl before rolling it out on a conveyor belt. Several feet away from the kitchen, a diner gets up from his bench, grabs the steaming bowl and brings it on to his table. Self-service at its most cool. Varun Tuli, 25-year-old owner of The Yum Yum Tree in south Delhi, has a winner on his hands.

When Tuli told restaurant consultant Arun Tyagi that he wanted to bring Chinese grills to town on a 6-foot-long conveyor belt, Tyagi was wary. “The concept was new and there was a risk that people wouldn’t accept the idea of a restaurant without waiters,” said Tyagi. But Tuli, former engineer and Lehmann Brothers intern, knew enough of international food trends to bet his money on a moving belt. “In the West, the conveyor belt has existed for over 40 years and many sushi diners have one. I thought it was time to bring it to India. We got the belt fabricated here, instead of importing it from Korea or Japan,” said the alumnus of St Columba’s School, Delhi. His first restaurant offers 6,500 square-feet of dining with options of a separate grill section, formal dining and a bar set up in the backdrop of designer Manish Arora’s kitschy collages and mannequins in muti-coloured skirts.

In Mumbai, 21-year-old Rizwan Amlani has converted an old villa overlooking the Juhu beach into a restaurant, DelItalia, where homely Italian recipes are laid out on chequered tablecloths. If you fancy a John Dory with fresh Porcini or a wood-fired aubergine and pesto lasagna, this should be the place for you. The emphasis is on using fresh vegetables. “The concept is new and along with my brother, I plan to introduce similar casual dining formats in other metros as well. The menu is 70 per cent vegetarian,” said Amlani.

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