Cuisine Forecast

[prasad2]

Dear David

Thanks for being on the egullet.

I enjoyed cooking with you shoulder to shoulder and I hope I answered some of your several questions you posed to me.

I enjoyed reading your report INDIAN COOKING 101 and was totally fascinated and being an Indian chef I thought everyone who loves good food should read you report.

Here is my question to you Sir!

Based on your quote "I am posittively convinced that Americans, if they know Indian food, would love Indian food".

At what stage of of LIFE is Indian Cuisine, it's ambience and service and decor.

You as a great writer, cook book author, critique, a travel writer and a great fan of food,

Could you please give us your insight and thoughts on INDIAN CUISINE:

1) Ten Years Ago

2) Today

3) Forecast on Future.

Thanks David,

Chef Prasad Chirnomula

[David Rosengarten]

Dear Prasad,

I enjoyed cooking with you too, in Stamford, CT!

As you know, I'm an Indian-food freak. I got hooked 30 years ago, just by going to a dreary, tired, very old-fashioned neighborhood Indian restaurant. The food was not great Indian food--but I could see in it the amazing possibilities that this food had. Soon after that I went to London for the first time--where Indian restaurants are on every corner, with much better food--and fell totally in love. I have since been to India, and am firmly convinced that Indian cuisine is among the 4 or 5 most exciting cuisines in the world.

I'm also convinced that Americans would love this cuisine, if they knew it. I can't tell you how many times people have told me they don't like Indian food --"I don't like curry," they usually say--and then have had a total conversion after I'm dragged them to a good Indian restaurant (it happened just the other night at Bay Leaf, in Manhattan.) As restaurants learn to serve fresher food, more varied food, and food that reflects the amazing regional diversity in India, I think Americans will start catching on. I'm a little concerned about the "Indian fusion" movement--not that the restaurants aren't good. But with so much education needing to be done on the subject of authentic Indian food--is it really time to start riffing? I think indian-cuisine neophytes find it confusing.