All the chefs you don’t know. yet.

A list perhaps worth its expensive newsprint, and the rare attention of its readers, for very few good reasons: as an evaluation of merit by a (credible) critic. Or, as advice to readers, helping them make buying decisions – Best Colleges, Best Cars – backed by market research. or, the opinion of peers, voted judiciously, with checks and balances, but significantly au courant,

In India, food awards/lists generally do not resonate with a larger public as they fail to recognize changes and changemakers early on, and serve as a recommendation to the public instead. They anoint anyone. When was the last time you ate at a restaurant because its chef won an award?

In 2022, young chefs and flavor makers are battling for a change in the way restaurants work: many have taken job or personal losses, some have moved to smaller cities or home towns, many are rethinking where they are. How to want to live and yes, cook more authentically.

The audience has also changed. Diners are looking for more depth, uniqueness, quality and wellness on their plate. What are the trends for about 2022 and who are?

exit, coffee shop

Chefs seeking to open commercially successful restaurants often rely on the same ‘coffee shop’ formula: Indian-Chinese-Continental-Bar to cater to mass audiences. But, now some chefs are throwing out the cookie cutters. A big post-pandemic trend is the rise of small, individualistic venues, trying to transform the personal – chef’s life experiences, upbringing, travel – into the universal.

Chef Pallavi Mithika Menon at the Navu Project serves “bistro food, as it should be” at the Bangalore International Centre. Ingredients are grown and purchased directly from producers, everything is made from scratch (including charcuterie), and Flavor Menon’s multicultural upbringing (“I had four grandparents from four different parts of the country…”) and inspired by the times in Italy. Where he worked with Slow Food International.

Menon took over the center kitchen in 2020, at a time when she “had enough”, as she says, in commercial restaurants, despite working in some of the best – Zodiac in Mumbai, Eddie Singh’s bar, Abhijeet Saha’s Caperberry and Fava (where she was Head Chef) – since 2004, with breaks to do a Masters in Human Ecology and Sustainability from the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Bras, Piedmont. He then worked with Slow Food International for two years, trying to establish a network of young chefs and farm producers in India in 2014–15, who were early champions of farm-to-fork food. (It was only a year later that Musk, led by Prateek Sadhu, came to the fore and became the most successful champion of this way of eating out).

At Navu, Menon’s food is as hearty-but-refined options as tuna and beef. bresaolaSmoked Mackerel on Toast, Cauliflower and Leek Crme Brulee, Celeriac Pasta, Oxtail puttanesca even more. She also runs a profitable catering company. “We don’t have to wander to the audience, in fact, now, the audience likes us sometimes,” she says.

Chef Niyati Rao’s attitude in Mumbai seems pretty much the same. Eka, her restaurant, is rated as ingredients-forward, offering unusual offerings such as sea urchins harvested in South India (when she can find them) as well as seasonal and readily available but low-priced produce such as That mogri (radish pods).

For chef Megha Kohli in Delhi, the pandemic sparked depression and loss, which she has been coping with professional help but also through her food, documenting the journey on Instagram. A year after taking cooking classes, she is now Head Chef at Wine Company in Gurugram, bringing together fresh Mediterranean flavors that taste distinctly homely.

In Goa, weddings entrepreneur and San Francisco girl Ginni Kohli, who moved to Goa during the pandemic, brings that laid-back lifestyle with a cafe in Assam called Well, Neighbors, centered around excellent bread. Is. Imaginative toppings, gourmet burgers, single estate coffee, kombucha cocktails, Goan live bands and toasts with local community involvement make it very different from the swish brands of Delhi-Mumbai.

clear A list

Japanese restaurant Megu at The Leela Palace New Delhi made an appearance in Asia’s 50 best list this year at 49th place: notable because it competed against Japanese restaurants in Japan. Young chef Shubham Thakur, who took over operations in 2021 amid the pandemic, swiftly changed menus and fortunes, just as the marquee restaurant began a slide to Indianisation.

As soon as the loyalists began to return to the Thakur’s first rate Omakase – efficient and fresh sashimiTempura – carefully classical, he also called attention to grilled sea bass, which is brined, grilled, then put in huba leaf with a few drops of miso added to the skin.

Thakur, who learned the cuisine from Megu’s opening team early in her career, spent time in Wasabi, and then in Lodhi where she had to open a new restaurant before the pandemic was planned. He luckily found a place at his alma mater and made the most of it. Yet, we rarely see them in the national list.

Similarly, Utah, in Whitefield, Bengaluru, is highly favored by local “foodies” and visitors for the “real” taste of Karnataka. It serves about 80 cuisines from different regions and communities, and is researched so deeply, that you can see how anything like Mangalorean food is microscopically broken down according to the region’s communities – Catholic, Bayari Muslim, Saraswat, Bunt. and dishes. other communities. Attention to detail, even in Malnadi biryani, Kaima Un-Soujik Style meatballs from South Karnataka, or coastal dishes that use only Kari Uppu (black sea salt).

It took three years for a team of chefs and researchers to visit different communities in different regions in different seasons to collect 300-400 recipes and then reduce these to 100 for restaurants. Yet, for the depth that makes it perhaps the best researched Indian restaurant in India, Utah and its chef Mandar Sukhtankar are not on most lists.

If you’re looking for amazing food, there’s a lot going on under the radar (relatively speaking). Ishaar, Mumbai’s Prashant Issar is rising through the pandemic and adding outlets in Pune and Bengaluru.

Sahil Mehta, who introduced Parisian-style bakeries in India with La Opera and runs Delhi’s hidden gem Paris My Love, is spreading culture and crafts to smaller towns in Rajasthan and Punjab, where older bakeries are better known. Wishes for a makeover with ingredients and techniques.

Marut Sikka, India’s most sought after caterer (and restaurateur), whose biryani And annual Pervez Musharraf was fed to aid in peace talks in Agra, most recently at the wedding of the year – Alia Bhatt and Ranbir Kapoor. If the promotion of culinary culture is a norm, all of these are hidden from plain sight.

regional renaissance

In a fragmented world, people often try to revisit and imagine the past. That’s what we’re seeing in the food world, as chefs and diners alike continue to discover their roots.

In Bengaluru, Sarposh, a new Kashmiri restaurant by Azmat Ali Mir, a computer science engineer-turned-cultural entrepreneur that seeks to bring authentic Kashmiri culture and stories to Bangalore, is garnering acclaim. wazwanHomemade dishes, breads and the best tabak maazi outside the valley.

In Pune, Chef Jatin Gautam, Pasha, at JW Marriott is taking a deep dive into the culinary cultures of Awadh and undivided Punjab. her kunna seminarTraditional nihariA recipe similar to Chiniot, a small town near Faisalabad in Pakistan, where mutton is slowly boiled for six to eight hours in an earthen pot, done with a finesse that would give the 19th century stirrup (Master Chef) Competition.

In Mumbai, the profitable delivery and catering businesses that came up during the pandemic offer food not made by any restaurant. Diners who are tired of Fusion are attracted to them. For example, the Saraswat food from Chef Amol Welling (@culinarykitchen_in), who also does Kokanastha Brahmin, Konkani and other Maharashtrian dishes, is a hit.

In Delhi, Chikita Gulati, a Gujarati, marries a Punjabi (her restaurant owner husband belongs to the family from the first Pandara Road, Gulatis restaurant of the same name, one of India’s first post Partition eateries), to a Maharashtrian aunt. Impressed and trained at Les Roche. Bluche, one of the world’s leading hospitality schools, serves up a heritage recipe of CKP Prawn Pulao (from the Pune community) with as much ease as an Old Delhi-style look for kebabs, Her tasting menu at the tiny 20 seater restaurant, Spice Market, she and her husband are full of such gems.

Shillong’s U&I Arts Cafe by Wanfai Nongram is a must-visit for anyone looking to take a deep dive into Khasi culture. More than 100 teas (including 5 local infusions), meals such as red potatoes and other snacks made from ingredients sourced directly from local farms originate from traditional tribal kitchens.

In Chennai, Chef Karthikeyan, who worked with several Michelin star chefs in Paris, and returned home to focus on cookies, has found a new opportunity through the pandemic. Their “Celebration” cookies, with quality ingredients and careful technique, are ideal for home entertainment. He now sends them across the country, and is representative of a new group of skilled cooks who have returned home to establish niche businesses.

Viewers are willing to pay for this creativity that is not available in regular food retail. And that’s why these stories are worth telling – and well listed!