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entertaining u newspaper: your weekly guide to entertainment
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by erin thursby
scopes1925@msn.com
WHAT: Cooking demo, five course meal and cookbook signing with celebrity chef Suvir Saran
WHEN: Cooking Class Jan 6th @6:30 PM Book Signing, 5 to 6 PM
WHERE: Apron’s Cooking School
Cost: $50
Suvir Saran doesn’t remember a time when he wasn’t cooking. When he thinks back to his childhood in India, his earliest memories of relatives are always associated with food. When the other boys had taken up their cricket bats, Saran stayed behind in the kitchen, always cooking.
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All these hours in the kitchen led him to a completely different approach to Indian cooking. This radical, yet sensible approach has made him the premier chef of Indian cuisine in the U.S. On Jan 6th, Saran will be coming to Jacksonville for an Apron’s Cooking School demo and a book signing. Since 2004 when he opened his New York restaurant, Dévi, Saran has been featured in the New York Times, Food & Wine as well as many other publications across the country.
Saran originally came to the United States in 1993 to study graphic design at the School of Visual Arts. He had so many friends and foodies over for dinner at night, teaching them how to cook Indian food, that he was forced to start charging for it. At the urging of friends and family, Saran opened his own catering business. The highlight of his catering career so far has been cooking the first Indian meal ever served at Carnegie Hall for a host of international celebrities and dignitaries in honor of the 50th anniversary of India’s independence in 1997.
Reading his Indian Home Cooking: A Fresh Introduction to Indian Food I noticed a lot of similarities between American Southern-style hospitality and Indian hospitality, so when I had him on the phone, interviewing for EU, I asked him about it. “It’s true, they are similar,” Saran says “It’s all about passion, love, a desire to love and spoil people. [It’s] Entertainment that is the way we should be living.”
Most Indian cookbooks, Saran laments, “are written like a great-grandmother wrote it.” Saran’s cookbook attempts to reflect modern Indian home-style cooking. Saran also thinks most cookbooks are needlessly intricate. “I think we like to make things difficult so as to justify our paycheck,” he joked. His book simplifies wherever possible. Saran zeroes in on what’s available in Indian kitchens today. Of the famed ghee butter Saran says, “We didn’t grow up with ghee, we grew up with the Indian version of canola oil.”
Each region of India is also very different, and Saran borrows from them all. Northern Indian food is “heavy on creams, dairy and meats.” Central focuses on vegan and vegetarian fare and the south tends toward use of spices, seafoods and coconut. As far as Saran is concerned, the food served in most Indian isn’t authentic. When he came to this country and went to Indian restaurants, he found that they were “serving some hybrid cuisine that wasn’t Indian.” Even though India has an extensive coastline, most Indian eateries don’t serve much in the way of fish and when they do, the results are often disastrous. “You don’t want to order seafood in most Indian restaurants, [they] just kill our meats and seafood…mostly by overcooking.”
Saran doesn’t believe that all curries should be exalted or condemned based on the impression of curry at one restaurant or in one dish. “When non-Indians tell us that they love or hate curry, we die a little inside, because curry can mean different things.” The term curry is often used in India as a catch-all phrase meaning sauce or gravy. French sauces or gravies can be as different as Indian curries can be. The word curry can also be used to denote the use of the curry plant in recipes, and lastly, curry can mean “that awful powder the English invented.”
To learn more about modern Indian cooking, you can see Chef Suvir Saran at the Apron’s Cooking School. Call (904) 262-4187 for more info. The demo menu will feature Puff Pastry Samosas with Green Peas; Ground Chicken with Spinach and Whole Spices; Stir-Fried Green Beans with Coconut; Eggplant Raita; Rice (Basmati and Lemon); Chutney (Green and Tamarind).
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