Talk Time: Southern and Indian
(Photo: City Grocery Restaurant Group)
When Vishwesh Bhatt, with roots in Gujarat, abandoned biology for cooking, his switch yielded rich dividends. A James Beard Award nominee and the chef at the famous City Grocery Restaurant Group in Oxford, Mississippi, Bhatt has been winning accolades for dishes that fuse okra and beans from the American South with the rich flavors of India.
How did you go from studying biology to
cooking?
I came here for graduate school and I started working
in kitchens to make money, and realized I really
enjoyed it. Sort of by chance, things opened up. I was
asked if I would want to work more than a couple of
nights. I said, ‘Sure.’ From there it just grew.
When you say you were working more than a
couple of nights, what kind of work was that?
Initially, I was just doing some prep work in the
kitchen, and then I was working the salad station
making salads, and stuff like that, whatever needed
to be done. There were a couple of things: One, I knew
how to cook. I wasn't very good at it and never thought
of doing it professionally. I grew up in a big family.
My mom was a very good cook. I've always been
around food. I understood how that worked. Even
within the kitchen, I could see what else was going
on, and quickly picked it up, and helped, if needed. To
the folks who hired me, that was an added bonus.
I clearly had an aptitude for it. I didn't know it at the
time, but now, 25 years later, I can look back and tell
that's what it was.
Coming back to Mississippi, what is the food
scene like there?
In the last ten years especially, things have just
exploded. People have traveled. People have eaten in
other places. People see what's going on around them,
in places like Atlanta, Nashville, New Orleans, not very
far from here. People demand good food. It's been a lot
of fun. We still have a long ways to go with a restaurant
in a very small college town. There are now a lot more
places that are trying to do things right.
How do you meld the Indian and the American
South cultures in your food?
I knew how to season things a certain way. I liked
my potatoes with cumin, for example. The first time
I made potatoes here, I went, ‘Hey, why don't we add
toasted crushed cumin in these mashed potatoes?’
To me, those flavors went together, and people accepted
it. They'd say, ‘Oh well, this is really interesting.
This is not how we would do it, but I see what you're
saying.’ My mom, when she cooked green beans, she
used sesame seeds. People use sesame seeds here
in the South, it's part of the Southern staple. Green
beans are also a Southern staple. They recognized both
things. They're like, ‘Okay, we understand this. We
may not necessarily do it this way, but okay. This is not
something really weird.’
Did you come across people, saying, ‘Oh, it looks
like it has an Indian touch, so it has to be spicy or hot.’
That seems like a very common misconception.
Yes. What I've said over the years, ‘Indian food
is spicy. We use spices but it doesn't mean it's hot.
There will be a lot of flavors. Spice does not equate
to chilies. Some of it does, but not all of it.’ Also, because
of our closeness to places like New Orleans,
rooted in French Creole, people are used to having hot
sausage or hot peppers to a degree, more so than, say,
somebody in Ohio.
Has your family tried your cooking? What do
they think?
It's a mixed reaction. Some of it they like. My dad
is 84. That's not an excuse, because even when he
was young, he liked what he liked. He's a fairly picky
eater. He likes to eat; as long as it's vegetarian, he's
game. While we're a very traditional Indian family,
we're a little bit nontraditional in the sense that
everybody in the family has traveled and lived other
places. If we go out, we'll eat other stuff. Of course,
we might come home and make food again, because
we're not satisfied (laughs).
What would you say is your comfort food?
I absolutely love a nice hearty dal with onions
and some ginger, and rice with some ghee. I also love
carbs, a good spaghetti, or some mashed potatoes, fried
chicken, and gravy.
A good old Southern boy...
Yeah. My favorite food is food that somebody cooks
for me. It really doesn't matter what it is, because it
doesn't happen very much. It doesn't have to be anything
fancy. The good times I remember as a kid were
sitting down at the table with family and friends and
eating. Even to this day, I have the most fun when we
have some food. We sit down at the table, whether it's
friends, or family, and talk about things that people talk
about every day. Food brings people together.
Green Mango
Slaw
6 large green (raw) mangoes, peeled and shredded
5 cucumbers, peeled, seeded, diced
6 large, ripe tomatoes, cored, seeded, and diced
2 small red onions, sliced thin
2 hot green chiles, minced
2 tbsp toasted cumin seeds
2 tbsp toasted sesame seeds
¼ cup chopped mint
¼ cup chopped cilantro
¼ cup chopped basil
½ cup lime juice
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp chaat masala
2 tsp mustard oil
salt and black pepper
Whisk the lime juice, sugar, chaat masala, and
mustard oil together until sugar is dissolved, and set
aside.
Mix everything else together in a large
bowl.
Pour the dressing over the slaw
mix, season with salt and pepper
as needed, and refrigerate for an
hour before serving.
Poornima Apte is a Boston-area freelance writer and editor. Learn more at WordCumulus.WordPress.com.
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