The old-world Mughlai flavours, found in Lashkari, Moplah, Awadhi and Salar Jung cuisine, rest in the hands of a chosen few. We get a taste of their secret recipes.
In a charmingly dilapidated bungalow at Parel, Mumbai, the kitchen is suffused with the aroma of exotic spices. It is noon and Kunwar Rani Begum Kulsum, 52, is busy slicing meat into tiny pieces while slivers of onion and chillies sweat in a deep-bottomed pan. She is cooking Tala Ghosht, a 100-year-old recipe of the Salar Jungs, the noble family which served the Nizams of Hyderabad. Begum Kulsum is a descendant of this family and this dish was a favourite of her grandmother, who used to cook it in the 1950s. “Tala Ghosht is safri khana (travel food) and we add no water to the dish so it can be preserved,” explains Kulsum, who now recreates these dishes at the ITC Grand Central in Mumbai. It was a custom with the Salar Jungs to be secretive about these recipes. So the daughters of the family weren’t allowed access to the kitchen and the secrets of the kitchen were shared only with daughters-in-law. “My grandmother was born in an aristocratic Iranian family and came to Raza-Yar Jung haveli at Darushafa, Hyderabad, after her wedding,” says Kulsum. “Nawab Yusuf Ali Khan Salar Jung III even had a separate bawarchi khana for experimenting with ingredients,” she says.
The Mughals and Arabs had brought with them a rich culinary tradition which perfectly garnished the existing cuisine of India. The vegetarian pulaos were cooked with meat to create the biryani, and the curries were flavoured with almonds and cashews. The cooking style was larger-than-life and extravagant, reflective of the time itself. In the era of McDonald’s and home delivery, and despite the entry of world cuisine like sushi and Thai food, traditional Indian cuisine, with its subtle and varied flavours, has hung on and survived, and old recipes from India’s past are routinely recreated, tweaked to suit today’s palate. In Hyderabad at the ITC Kakatiya, the executive chef, Chalapathi Rao has rediscovered forgotten recipes and recreated the magic of old Mughal cuisine. Rao says ancient recipes are thankfully making a comeback to the mainstream through food festivals.
“People are interested in their own cuisine,” says Rao, referring to the huge turnout the hotel got for their Mughal Food Festival held recently. “The cuisine is now a celebration and cooking it requires...
