India’s No. 1 chef sits down with Tatler Singapore ahead of Indian Accent’s highly anticipated two-week residency at Mandala Masters
In 2009, Indian food scarcely graced the tables of fine dining establishments globally. “Up to 10 years back, nobody knew about reasonable Indian food. Everything was dominated by a few certain things,” culinary director Manish Mehrotra of Indian Accent tells Tatler Singapore. The usual suspect, of course, was chicken tikka masala. “It's not even Indian,” Mehrotra says. “Fusion” was still a dirty word. The world remained in the dark about the regional intricacies of one of the planet’s greatest civilisations. Then Indian Accent came along.
“It's been 14 years of Indian Accent and it feels great because when we started for the first few months, we were an empty restaurant, and here we are,” Mehrotra says. Here we are indeed—in 14 years, Indian Accent has climbed up to No. 19 position on the Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants 2023 list up from No. 22 in 2022. It’s earned spot on Time magazine’s ‘World’s 100 Greatest Places’ in 2018. Mehrotra himself has been christened India’s No. 1 chef in India by Culinary Culture Co, American Express, The Economic Times and more. And together with his executive chef Shantanu Mehrotra (no relation), the iconic New Delhi institution continues to weave global, contemporary influences into classic Indian cuisine, painting for gourmands a blazing vision of India’s regional culinary riches.
Now, Indian Accent joins the ranks of other highly acclaimed restaurants like Narisawa and Gaggan with a highly anticipated two-week residency at Mandala Masters, happening from now until May 25. A 40-person strong team has set up camp in the kitchens of the private club, bringing with them 600 kilograms of ingredients and spice mixes to deliver Indian Accent’s firebrand cuisine to Singaporean palates. Less than a week before opening on May 9, 1,000 seats had already been booked. Amidst the furore of what is undoubtedly one of the most exciting culinary events in Singapore this month, Mehrotra reflects on how his brand has grown over the years. “In these 14 years I have learned, and my team has also learned with me. We have evolved. Our menu has evolved as a restaurant, as a chef, I have evolved. So, it's been a great journey.”
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The roots of genius
It’s almost unthinkable that a chef who has set ablaze traditional notions of fine dining like Manish Mehrotra almost didn’t become a chef. “During my childhood I never thought about being a chef, or inspired by my mother or aunts or grandmother. Although I used to help them in the kitchen, nothing of that sort happened to me. I was from a business family, and going to a hotel school was a career decision.”
It was at hotel school that Mehrotra fell in love with cooking. “I found the kitchen to be where I could innovate the most. It was where you can do something of your own.” The rest, as we say, is history. Mehrotra went onto work with the legendary Ananda Soloman at Thai Pavilion, before Old World Hospitality group founder Rohit Khattar dreamed up Indian Accent and brought Mehrotra to the team. It was there that Mehrotra met executive chef Shantanu Mehrotra, who was then a management trainee.
Khattar recalls that he was on the fence about whether the food at Indian Accent would be global cuisine with Indian ingredients, or Indian cuisine with global ingredients. That deliberation stopped when Mehrotra stepped in to assert his direction for the restaurant—a testament to his iron vision. It’s an approach that takes “inspiration from all walks of life”, including “traditional dishes, regional dishes, dishes from the interiors of India”, and “dishes from people's homes”. “Whenever I plan a menu,” Mehrotra tells us, “my travels all over the world, eating all over the world, helps me to create new dishes. It really helps to be diverse because my inspiration, my unique combinations, come from all different countries. It should have a little bit of nostalgia. It should remind you of something. And when you take a bite in your mouth, it should make you remember something.”
Take, for example, the doda burfi treacle tart, one of Mehrotra's favourite desserts on the Indian Accent menu. “That dessert came to my mind while eating treacle tart in Sainsbury’s, Holborn, in London,” he says. “It really felt like, oh, we have a similar kind of fudge in Punjab that I can make treacle tart with.” The result is an incredibly rich dessert that’s still very light and beautifully spiced, best enjoyed warm with a topping of caramelised milk ice cream. Or look at the meetha achaar pork spare ribs, another Indian Accent signature. You’d be hard-pressed to find pork ribs in Indian cuisine, but at Indian Accent, its glaze of meetha achaar, or sweet mango pickle, will be a familiar taste to many in India. The meat falls off the bone with a suggestion of resistance, deftly combining acidity with sweet and savoury profiles to present a dish that’s dangerously addictive.
Most excitingly, we’ll be seeing dishes in Singapore that you wouldn’t normally find at its landmark in New Delhi. A Wagyu pathar kebab graces the tasting menu here, served on top of a bone marrow, drizzled with a thick and luscious bone marrow nihari—according to Shantanu, an “age-old” stew that has a cherished place in his heart. “In India, we don't use beef. So it was a dream and pleasure to work with Wagyu because usually, we don't get these things in India. So it gives me something to learn,” Mehrotra says. The exploration has paid off—the kebab slices melt in your mouth, elevated by the moreish nihari. Bread is served on the side to scoop up the bone marrow and whatever’s left of the nihari, and the simple act of scooping up gravy with bread evokes an instinctual, full-body sensation of indulgence.
“When I plan my dishes for Indian Accent, the first thing I keep in mind is that whatever unique combination I am doing, there has to be a reason behind it. There has to be a story behind it. All the Indian Accent dishes are planned and invented in such a way that people from all walks of life, even those outside India, can relate to it.”
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