[Music]
while most of my friends spent a lot of
their time playing cricket and talking
about sports endlessly I was asked ureas
child who spent a lot of time in the
kitchen you know just trying to
understand to cook understanding the
nuances behind food and just
appreciating people who cooked the
earliest memory of food that I have
being made at home is the polio tray or
the tamarind rice or polio Garre if you
can call it in Canada made by my mom and
grandmom you know it’s like this element
of drama that comes alive when they
decided to make it antique brass vessels
would be brought down from the Attic
polished like how it is you know
glistening there and it will be filled
to the brim with rice powder oil spice
pastes and whatnot and they would regale
me with stories of their childhood and
the kind of food that they ate as they
mixed it so it’s almost like their labor
of love that came through so I say the
love that is polio dry so for me polio
dray or any food so that matter was all
about love it was about conversations
and most importantly it was about
memories you know food has that ability
to transport you you know you smell
something and immediately you are taken
back to your childhood so that is what
food does to me
so for some weird reason I did an MBA
maybe I should have done culinary arts
whether being in the u.s. I’m not really
sure how much I took away from my
b-school degree but being in the u.s.
just exposed me to a lot of food you
know international cuisine Street food
Michelin star and she’s shamelessly
inviting yourself over to people from
international communities and saying hey
I’m home can you make something of your
choice but with that exposure there I
feel my palate evolved and with that
kind of a nuanced palate I moved back to
India and I thought I could showcase the
love for food that I had through an
entrepreneurial venture and I launched
something called Paita app I’m not sure
if many of you would have seen Pater
but these were these kiosks shaped like
an autorickshaw met vantage points in
the city that served fresh and healthy
raps like party rolls I realized that
running a food business needed much more
than just being passionate about food I
opened up a Pandora’s box and I had to
call it quits so it’s it’s something
that you know something that you
nurtured just went down the drain
so I was dejected and I was kind of the
connect that I had with food was lost so
I felt a disconnect there very cinematic
I went on the soul-searching trip see
that there the train there so I went on
this trip and I chose Tirunelveli
because I had not heard much about the
food from the region and other than the
terminal Billy huh la so I went there
and it was the time of harvest just look
at that just crisp I mean it’s just
green Thorin the oil will have been so
long a layer under mud ring so it was so
beautiful and the beauty about that was
they were farm was there they were
overjoyed with that year’s bountiful
harvest that they had and they were
singing and the other side I saw people
kind of getting together to cook and the
interesting bit about the cooking
experience what I saw was people from
various communities caste creed religion
socioeconomic conditions pulled in their
resources to make that particular recipe
so for example someone brought rice
someone brought lentils someone brought
vegetables someone brought oil firewood
and they kind of cooked something
together I mean this was just my dream
come true I mean I am there sitting
standing there and watching them and
they are singing someone’s reaping their
harvest and they’re cooking so as usual
I shamelessly invited myself over and I
said hey what is it that you guys are
making knowing very well they will
extend an invitation to eat they did and
I enjoyed the meal with them as I ate
they regaled me with the entire regions
culinary history the kind of food that
they make at home songs from the lead
region legends and you know just history
as such and that is when it dawned on me
this
exactly what I should be doing it turns
out that the recipe that I actually ate
what they made was called the curtain
showroom curtain should split that way
is basically made when people kind of
get together time when during harvest or
time when people get together at a time
of harvest using the fresh produce that
was the Eureka moment when I thought
this is exactly what I should be doing
documenting heirloom recipes traditions
culinary practices and legends across
India
that’s me shamelessly eating the coot
insurer so from there I set out on a
mission I gonna share with you two
stories from two regions in the south of
India that will give you a culinary
history of the region
even though I’ve documented stories and
recipes from places across India I
specifically chose to showcase the south
of India for two things I want to let
the world know that there’s more to
South Indian food then idli dosa Minh
Dada and sambar
I’ve had this I had this guy’s so off I
went on this trip to coconut conga nod
is Salem erode through port Coimbatore
in the entire region there so I went
there and it’s culinary history is very
very unique there are two recipes that
stood out to me one was the Polly Polly
I’m chicken and the patch Polly rasam
the Polly Polly I’m chicken you know
it’s probably a phenomenon today it’s
available in most of the restaurants
both here and out of India but would you
believe if I told you these recipes came
out of sheer poverty so like I said many
many years ago this was an entire region
struck by poverty and people had large
families to feed they could afford only
one chicken and this they cut the
chicken in small cubes
they cut coconuts the same size as
chicken added very very minimal masalas
oil and salt because that’s how much
they could afford and cooked up a very
rustic dish called the Pali Pali I’m
chicken the reason they added coconuts
is because when small kids bit into
these pea
they won’t know the differentiate
between what was chicken and what was
coconut that was the level of poverty I
mean a sheer creative element that comes
out in an adverse situation like this
same thing with the particular Assam
which is nothing but tamarind that’s
been soaking in water for a few hours
it’s removed
lots of curry leaves coriander salt and
spices are added and just mixed without
boiling why didn’t they boil because
they couldn’t afford firewood so what I
thought from this is adversity is the
mother of all creations I mean here you
are in a situation very very adverse you
have all odds against you you have very
very minimal resources but what happens
your creative best comes out from there
I go to Koval putting Koval Patty is a
very dry barren arid region so no
cultivation possible whatsoever but yet
I realized that I saw large lands filled
with peanuts that’s been drying so I
struck up a conversation with the locals
I asked them hey anger where is this
coming from you don’t have any kind of
cultivation here where is this from for
which he tells me that this is an
age-old practice where peanuts have been
sent all the way from Gujarat down south
to Koval party for it to be dried and
sent back I said okay that probably
makes sense because you know you have
Gujarat which is the largest producer of
peanuts in India and you people down
south are making use of the abundance of
sunlight but what did the local start
doing
they started trading in peanuts they
started extracting oil from peanuts so
the cuisine as such is peanut oil
intensive you know you have the local
trading people they are called the nod
arse they have oil shops or Jannik
adenosyl only I’m the mothering so they
have oil shops if the entire cuisine
that is also influenced so peanut
chutney they even make peanut Russell
and last but not the least you have the
Koval particular metal so ladies and
gentlemen thank you so this is nothing
but a story of a peanut that travels all
all the way from Gujarat down south for
it to be just dried and sent back but
morphs into a phenomenon that influences
an entire region’s
trade Commerce economics you name it
everything is influenced in this region
so what I have really understood from
this segment is food has no boundaries I
mean there are dishes that we eat on a
day-to-day basis that are not even
Indian forget South Indian we have
always had the South Indian North Indian
divide but take for example we have
coconuts that have come from Papua New
Guinea asafoetida that came from
Afghanistan tomatoes were considered
toxic until 300-400 years ago the red
chillies without the Portuguese we
wouldn’t even be having that as part of
a kiss cuisine but yet this forms a
staple in what we eat every day so every
dish that we know and love today has
travelled from afar the reality is that
every well-known dish is the result of a
long and complicated history of fusion
immigration and circumstantial
adaptation that’s really what food is so
to kind of summarize and conclude you
know I’ve spent the last few years all
across India to document food and with
the 2000 hours that I’ve spent
documenting 600 such inspiring stories
from people and over 5,000 quaint
heirloom recipes that you can’t find on
Google what I realized this food brings
people together
adversity leads to creativity and food
is Beyond Boundaries thank you very much [Applause]
while most of my friends spent a lot of
their time playing cricket and talking
about sports endlessly I was asked ureas
child who spent a lot of time in the
kitchen you know just trying to
understand to cook understanding the
nuances behind food and just
appreciating people who cooked the
earliest memory of food that I have
being made at home is the polio tray or
the tamarind rice or polio Garre if you
can call it in Canada made by my mom and
grandmom you know it’s like this element
of drama that comes alive when they
decided to make it antique brass vessels
would be brought down from the Attic
polished like how it is you know
glistening there and it will be filled
to the brim with rice powder oil spice
pastes and whatnot and they would regale
me with stories of their childhood and
the kind of food that they ate as they
mixed it so it’s almost like their labor
of love that came through so I say the
love that is polio dry so for me polio
dray or any food so that matter was all
about love it was about conversations
and most importantly it was about
memories you know food has that ability
to transport you you know you smell
something and immediately you are taken
back to your childhood so that is what
food does to me
so for some weird reason I did an MBA
maybe I should have done culinary arts
whether being in the u.s. I’m not really
sure how much I took away from my
b-school degree but being in the u.s.
just exposed me to a lot of food you
know international cuisine Street food
Michelin star and she’s shamelessly
inviting yourself over to people from
international communities and saying hey
I’m home can you make something of your
choice but with that exposure there I
feel my palate evolved and with that
kind of a nuanced palate I moved back to
India and I thought I could showcase the
love for food that I had through an
entrepreneurial venture and I launched
something called Paita app I’m not sure
if many of you would have seen Pater
but these were these kiosks shaped like
an autorickshaw met vantage points in
the city that served fresh and healthy
raps like party rolls I realized that
running a food business needed much more
than just being passionate about food I
opened up a Pandora’s box and I had to
call it quits so it’s it’s something
that you know something that you
nurtured just went down the drain
so I was dejected and I was kind of the
connect that I had with food was lost so
I felt a disconnect there very cinematic
I went on the soul-searching trip see
that there the train there so I went on
this trip and I chose Tirunelveli
because I had not heard much about the
food from the region and other than the
terminal Billy huh la so I went there
and it was the time of harvest just look
at that just crisp I mean it’s just
green Thorin the oil will have been so
long a layer under mud ring so it was so
beautiful and the beauty about that was
they were farm was there they were
overjoyed with that year’s bountiful
harvest that they had and they were
singing and the other side I saw people
kind of getting together to cook and the
interesting bit about the cooking
experience what I saw was people from
various communities caste creed religion
socioeconomic conditions pulled in their
resources to make that particular recipe
so for example someone brought rice
someone brought lentils someone brought
vegetables someone brought oil firewood
and they kind of cooked something
together I mean this was just my dream
come true I mean I am there sitting
standing there and watching them and
they are singing someone’s reaping their
harvest and they’re cooking so as usual
I shamelessly invited myself over and I
said hey what is it that you guys are
making knowing very well they will
extend an invitation to eat they did and
I enjoyed the meal with them as I ate
they regaled me with the entire regions
culinary history the kind of food that
they make at home songs from the lead
region legends and you know just history
as such and that is when it dawned on me
this
exactly what I should be doing it turns
out that the recipe that I actually ate
what they made was called the curtain
showroom curtain should split that way
is basically made when people kind of
get together time when during harvest or
time when people get together at a time
of harvest using the fresh produce that
was the Eureka moment when I thought
this is exactly what I should be doing
documenting heirloom recipes traditions
culinary practices and legends across
India
that’s me shamelessly eating the coot
insurer so from there I set out on a
mission I gonna share with you two
stories from two regions in the south of
India that will give you a culinary
history of the region
even though I’ve documented stories and
recipes from places across India I
specifically chose to showcase the south
of India for two things I want to let
the world know that there’s more to
South Indian food then idli dosa Minh
Dada and sambar
I’ve had this I had this guy’s so off I
went on this trip to coconut conga nod
is Salem erode through port Coimbatore
in the entire region there so I went
there and it’s culinary history is very
very unique there are two recipes that
stood out to me one was the Polly Polly
I’m chicken and the patch Polly rasam
the Polly Polly I’m chicken you know
it’s probably a phenomenon today it’s
available in most of the restaurants
both here and out of India but would you
believe if I told you these recipes came
out of sheer poverty so like I said many
many years ago this was an entire region
struck by poverty and people had large
families to feed they could afford only
one chicken and this they cut the
chicken in small cubes
they cut coconuts the same size as
chicken added very very minimal masalas
oil and salt because that’s how much
they could afford and cooked up a very
rustic dish called the Pali Pali I’m
chicken the reason they added coconuts
is because when small kids bit into
these pea
they won’t know the differentiate
between what was chicken and what was
coconut that was the level of poverty I
mean a sheer creative element that comes
out in an adverse situation like this
same thing with the particular Assam
which is nothing but tamarind that’s
been soaking in water for a few hours
it’s removed
lots of curry leaves coriander salt and
spices are added and just mixed without
boiling why didn’t they boil because
they couldn’t afford firewood so what I
thought from this is adversity is the
mother of all creations I mean here you
are in a situation very very adverse you
have all odds against you you have very
very minimal resources but what happens
your creative best comes out from there
I go to Koval putting Koval Patty is a
very dry barren arid region so no
cultivation possible whatsoever but yet
I realized that I saw large lands filled
with peanuts that’s been drying so I
struck up a conversation with the locals
I asked them hey anger where is this
coming from you don’t have any kind of
cultivation here where is this from for
which he tells me that this is an
age-old practice where peanuts have been
sent all the way from Gujarat down south
to Koval party for it to be dried and
sent back I said okay that probably
makes sense because you know you have
Gujarat which is the largest producer of
peanuts in India and you people down
south are making use of the abundance of
sunlight but what did the local start
doing
they started trading in peanuts they
started extracting oil from peanuts so
the cuisine as such is peanut oil
intensive you know you have the local
trading people they are called the nod
arse they have oil shops or Jannik
adenosyl only I’m the mothering so they
have oil shops if the entire cuisine
that is also influenced so peanut
chutney they even make peanut Russell
and last but not the least you have the
Koval particular metal so ladies and
gentlemen thank you so this is nothing
but a story of a peanut that travels all
all the way from Gujarat down south for
it to be just dried and sent back but
morphs into a phenomenon that influences
an entire region’s
trade Commerce economics you name it
everything is influenced in this region
so what I have really understood from
this segment is food has no boundaries I
mean there are dishes that we eat on a
day-to-day basis that are not even
Indian forget South Indian we have
always had the South Indian North Indian
divide but take for example we have
coconuts that have come from Papua New
Guinea asafoetida that came from
Afghanistan tomatoes were considered
toxic until 300-400 years ago the red
chillies without the Portuguese we
wouldn’t even be having that as part of
a kiss cuisine but yet this forms a
staple in what we eat every day so every
dish that we know and love today has
travelled from afar the reality is that
every well-known dish is the result of a
long and complicated history of fusion
immigration and circumstantial
adaptation that’s really what food is so
to kind of summarize and conclude you
know I’ve spent the last few years all
across India to document food and with
the 2000 hours that I’ve spent
documenting 600 such inspiring stories
from people and over 5,000 quaint
heirloom recipes that you can’t find on
Google what I realized this food brings
people together
adversity leads to creativity and food
is Beyond Boundaries thank you very much [Applause]
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