A feast of a dialog, garnished with lucid declarations about fusion meals, sparks one’s urge for food for chef and entrepreneur Ritu Dalmia’s upcoming four-day pop-up menu in Delhi. She is bringing a few of the choicest dishes from her Milan-based Indian restaurant Cittamani to her Italian restaurant Diva on September 18. The unique menu is as a lot a celebration of 25 years of Diva as it’s of Ritu’s expansive culinary journey.
The unique menu is as a lot a celebration of 25 years of Diva
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Cittamani pop-up will probably be introduced in a thali format — an Ayurvedic strategy to consuming that continues to be practised in Indian households right this moment. The starters embrace membership kachori, burrata with tomato and kairi launji, and basera me sayala, a Sindhi-style fish. For the predominant course, anticipate lamb chops served with adraki gravy; shyam savera that includes torai and apricot kofta with lehsuni palak and tamatar kaju; and Kayasth-style hen pasande in badami sauce. Punctuated by a candy ending, the fourth course has two desserts, baked boondi with rabdi and bhapa doi paired with berries.
Bhapa doi, berries
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To a naïve thoughts, this interactive culinary dialogue between India and Italy, East and West, nationwide and worldwide, is suggestive of an alternate or a fusion of types. But Ritu quells all queries with a terse reply that tickles one’s curiosity about the dishes on this particular menu. She says, “I am actually quite a purist. Also, the word fusion has been misused. So, kachori with burrata is not fusion, for me, because I am not messing around with the taste and the flavour. I am just substituting some ingredients. Some people have done an amazing job with fusion food, but I am not that person. So, apart from a few jugalbandis between L Subramaniam and Stéphane Grappelli, I stick to purity, when it comes to cuisine and music.”
Ritu claims {that a} simplistic, community-driven strategy in the direction of Indian meals units her restaurant, Cittamani, aside from the relaxation
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Ritu claims {that a} simplistic, community-driven strategy in the direction of Indian meals units her restaurant, Cittamani, aside from the relaxation. “Cittamani’s food is all about community meals. It’s all about home food. When we opened in Italy, people thought Indian food was all about butter chicken and dal. Italians go out to eat their home food. So, my idea of Cittamani was really to show how home cooking is done in many different parts of India; no frills, nothing fancy, just honest food — whether it’s my Marwari home-cooked food or Kayasth menu,” she says.
Cittamani in Italy
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Ritu’s cooking prowess pivots on utilizing conventional recipes with native elements. She elaborates her approach with examples of a number of dishes at her Italian restaurant, like a chaat made with Jerusalem artichoke. “This is basically a lauki chaat which my grandmother used to make, and it was the only way she could get us to have vegetables like lauki. So, instead of importing lauki there, we substitute it with Jerusalem artichoke,” she explains.
Celeriac chaat
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Another fascinating dish that additionally figures on the pop-up menu is shyam savera. “During puja time in Kolkata, one made vegetarian food without onion and garlic. So, shyam savera was always a favourite. It is a lauki kofta dish and is called shyam savera because of the white and orange gravy reflective of morning and evening,” provides Ritu.
Lamb chops, adraki gravy
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The choice of dishes on this menu stands dictated by Ritu’s private favourites at Cittamani. The silver jubilee celebrations of Diva, in fact, will proceed with extra pop-ups (together with the one with Michelin-starred chef Viviana Varese, who has partnered with Cittamani), menu revivals (Diva’s menu from 2005-2012) and the launch of a brand new menu early October.
Cittamani menu will probably be accessible from September 18 to 21, 12.30pm to 11.30pm, at Diva, M-8A, M Block Market, Greater Kailash II, New Delhi. A meal for 2 is priced upwards of ₹2,900. For reservations, name 011-41637858, +917827934131