Sarson
Ka Saga in Amritsar: The food joints
you’ve to hit in the Walled City
|
Hello there. Welcome to another edition of
Foodgasm – a five-course meal for your
inbox. This week we are doing things a
little differently as Avinash Mudaliar, one
of the co-writers of Foodgasm, visited one
of the most taste bud-friendly places on
earth.
Around the globe – whenever one thinks of
Indian culture, the one that’s popular with
everyone barring Jhumpa Lahiri stans – they
associate it with Punjabi culture which has
become one of India’s greatest exports along
with CEOs and Prime Ministers.
As Indians, we are blessed with the fact
that almost every part of the country has a
unique cultural offering. And they don’t
come more unique than Amritsar where even
vegetarianism’s harshest critics admitted
defeat.
Anthony Bourdain, vegetarianism's biggest
bete noire since Bengalis, said after
eating at Kesar Da Dhaba in
Amritsar: "If this is what vegetarianism
meant in most of the places that practice it
in the West, I’d be at least half as much
less of a dick about the subject.”
|
But what is it that makes Amritsar’s food so
divine?
Avinash asked every dhaba owner, chaiwala
and anyone willing to lend him an ear: “What
makes the food so special?” And they said:
“It’s the water.” Of course, that’s not
surprising since Amritsar literally
translates to “the pool of nectar”.
So, this week, instead of the usual
five-course meal, we are going to take a
trip through our favourite joints which will
be a gastronomic guide for anyone who wants
to visit the city.
And now a question that will be answered
later in the newsletter: Which princely
state had a kulcha in its flag?
PS: For our loyal foodies, we’ve linked
every place’s Google Map location so all
you’ve to do is save it for the future.
Please note that Avinash paid for all
his meals and none of the restaurants
mentioned here had any inkling they were
being ranked or reviewed.
|
|
|
The
Holy Trinity of Punjabi
Cooking
|
There’s a muhabara (idiom for all you
International Board snobs) in Hindi that
goes: Raag Rasoi Paagdi Kabhi Kabhi Ban Jaye
(It’s impossible to replicate one’s tune
(raag), one’s dish (rasoi) and one’s paagdi
(turban). While raag and paagdi are outside
our jurisdiction, we did find a few joints
where the rasoi appears to be replicable.
Just like gym bros judge one another based
on their Bench Press, Squat and DeadLift
one-rep max lifts, the key to decoding,
ranking, and quantifying the quality of
Punjabi cooking is to rate them based on
three basic dishes:
1) Sarson ka Saag
2) Palak Paneer
3) Yellow Daal
So, Avinash made it a point to try the
sarson ka saag, palak paneer and daal at
every place. There’s an elegance to the
simplicity of these dishes which makes it
easy to separate the wheat from the chaff.
The restaurants which made the finals of
the Saga of Saags – the culinary equivalent
of Dance of the Dragons – were Yellow Chilli
Restaurant, Kesar Da Dhaba, Brothers and Bharawan. Please note
that being number 1 is worth three points,
number 2 two points and number 3 one point.
Palak Paneer
1)
Kesar Da Dhaba 🥇
2)
Brothers Amritsari🥈
3)
Bharawan Da Dhaba 🥉
Honourable Mention: Yellow Chilli Restaurant
(it was Mutton Saagwalla)
Saarson Ka Saag
1)
Brothers Amritsari Dhaba 🥇
2)
Bharawan Da Dhaba and Kesar Da Dhaba 🥈
Yellow Daal
1)
Kesar Da Dhaba 🥇
2)
Bharawan Da Dhaba 🥈
3)
Brothers 🥉
Overall
1) Kesar Da Dhaba – 8 points 🥇
2)
Bharawan Da Dhaba – 6 points 🥈
3)
Brothers Amritsari Dhaba – 5 points 🥉
And
just in case you’re a fan of baingan bharta,
the best place was Bharawan Da Dhaba,
followed by Kesar Da Dhaba.
|
Bharawan Da
Dhaba Vegetarian
Delights
|
Long before Independence and Partition, a
man from Sialkot (now in Pakistan) started
selling Punjabi food in a tent in Amritsar.
That tent became an eatery whose culinary
expertise withstood the vagaries of time and
economic churn caused by the Indo-Pakistani
Wars of 1965 and 1971, and then the 1984.
The current owner Subhash Vij joined the
business in 1975 after graduating and they
have not looked back since and Bharawan Da Dhaba is
now a must-stop.
Just a ten-minute walk from the Golden
Temple in Amritsar, the vegetarian dhaba is
a favourite with all and sundry, and some of
its more famous dishes include chole kulche, baigan ka bharta
and paneer subzji.
However, we found that while the daal makhni is a
crowd favourite, sarson ka saag, palak paneer and the
yellow daal are out
of this world.
|
|
|
A few millennia ago, evolution played a
clever trick dividing the world into
digestive haves and have-nots. The haves
were those who could consume the OG
superfood milk as an adult and the have-nots
were those who couldn’t. This ability to
break down lactose (in milk) after becoming
an adult is considered one of the best
examples of natural selection in humans.
This was essential because for a long time,
milk was the OG superfood helping humans
thrive in times of turpitude. It’s believed
that 1/3rd of the human population gained
this trait in just a couple of millennia thanks to
famines and disease, in essence
creating a superior group which has better
mineral density, height and vitamin D.
Therefore, even evolution agrees that those
who can relish lassi (the greatest form of
milk that exists, the true crème de la crème
of milk-based offerings) are superior, and
no one does lassi better than Gian Di Hatti.
The shop is en route to the Golden Temple
and there’s hardly anyone who doesn’t make a
pitstop to savour this mouthwatering
offering. According to Prabhpreet Singh, the
fourth-generation owner of the shop, it was
founded by his great grandfather Lala
Gurditta Mal in 1927. In fact, his father
Gurinder Singh and elder brother Charanjit
Singh also sit in the shop to serve the
customers. Besides, lassis, Gian Di Hatti
also makes amazing khoya burfi, pedha and milk cake.
|
|
|
Chai
Pe Charcha at Giani’s Tea
Stall
|
There’s a delightful reference to tea in
Asterix in Britain, which in our opinion is
one of the top three offerings by Messrs
Goscinny-Uderzo. On a trip to that sleepy
island, Asterix and a group of Brits are
forced to face off against the Romans
without any magic option. And that’s when
the tiny Gaul remembers that he has some tea
leaves in his pocket and goes on to create
British’s favourite non-alcoholic drink.
|
It’s a drink firmly lodged in the firmament
of many countries, including Britain whose
favourite dystopian author George Orwell
even wrote an article on 11 Rules for Tea
Making. Of course, the son of Bihar would’ve
discovered utopia if he just visited
Amritsar.
Amritsar makes great chai with the denizens
preferring a milky sweet masala version as
opposed to the kadak Mumbai iteration. While
chai is a top-tier drink in almost every
shop in Amritsar, if one had to put a name
one would choose Giani’s Tea Stall.
Not only is its tea top drawer, but it also
has amazing kachoris, bread omelettes and
paneer pakoras.
|
When a hardcore carnivore bows to the
magnificence of paneer pakoras, you know
it’s something special.
|
|
|
A
Non-Vegetarian Side
Trip
|
|
|
A
Delectable Dessert - Rana’s Fruit
Cream
|
And finally, no meal is complete without a
proper dessert and the winner in this case
is Rana’s Fruit Cream, a
non-descript shop that wouldn’t get a second
glance in the city’s bustling Lohgarh area.
While it might not look appetising to
gourmands who value aesthetics over taste, a
large fruit cream cup will make all your
troubles go away. For a person like Avinash
hailing from Mumbai, it gave Bachelorr’s, a
legendary juice centre near Girgaum
Chowpatty a run for its money.
|
|
|
The
Great Kulcha Revolution: Can you
smell what the pehelwans are
cooking?
|
Every city has a dish that rises over every
other offering to define its culinary
landscape. Delhi has chole bhature, Kolkata
the kathi roll and Mumbai the vada pav. And
for Amritsar, it is the Amritsari Kulcha, a
stuffed flatbread that’s quite different
from the kulcha that’s served in other parts
of India.
In fact, Michelin Star Chef Vikas Khanna
recently shared a video of himself
making an Amritsari kulcha and
wrote: "Almost 40 years ago, I used to
practice making Kulchas on the streets of
Amritsar. Whenever I go back to the same
places, they will always request me to make
one. I think I still got it."
Soft on the inside and crispy on the
outside, the Amritsari Kulcha is so
delectable that it would make an atheist
believe in God, because it’s not feasible
that a creature which evolved naturally
could create something which seems like the
product of divine intervention. And it all
started 67 years ago in the Walled City. Pehalwan Kulcha Shop
at Dhab Khaitan is often credited with
being the pioneer of the Amritsari Kulcha.
The story goes that in 1952, Pehalwan Atma
Ram, a professional wrestler, borrowed the
concept of the Peshwarai Khameeri Roti and
flipped it to make the Amristari naan. North
India’s warm climate made sourdough
untenable, so he used maida and stuffed it
with boiled potatoes to make a whole meal.
Later on, tamarind-onion chutney and chana
was added to make it a more wholesome meal.
Later Atma Ram’s son Nathu Ram, another
professional wrestler took over from his
father. But the kulcha's genesis is even
longer. Its lineage can be traced back to
Mughal kitchens. It was offered to Shah
Jahan who loved it so much that he had it
for breakfast and lunch, and the dish spread
across the realm wherever the Mughals and
Nizams went. In fact, Lahore’s culinary
tradition was so similar to Amritsar’s that
it was often said that if one toured both
cities, one’s tastebuds wouldn’t be able to
tell the difference.
Much like hilsa formed an important part of the
clarion call for Bangladesh’s
independence, the kulcha became the official
symbol of the Hyderabad state flag thanks to
the Asaf Jahi dynasty. Just imagine,
choosing a kulcha while other states had
lions and elephants as their official
insignia. But there’s a good reason for it.
|
Asaf Jahi I and
VII
The Asaj Jahi Dynasty (the Nizams of
Hyderabad’s official title) was founded by
Mir Qaram-ud-Din Khan Asaf Jahi, who was a
courtier at the Mughal court. Jahi’s family
had served the Mughals for generations
When Mir Qamar-ud-Din was appointed the
Governor of Deccan, he was given the title
of Nizam-Ul-Mulk. Before taking up the job,
he went to meet his spiritual guru, the Sufi
mystic Hazrat Nizamuddin Aurangabadi.
According to legend, he was offered a meal
of kulchas tied in a yellow cloth. A
famished Mir Qamar-ud-Din devoured seven
kulchas and the Sufi mystic prophesied he
would rule for seven generations. And so,
they did till the last Nizam Asaf Jahi VII
was outmanoeuvred by another epochal man
named Sardar Vallabhai Patel. But let’s not
digress, that's a tale for another time.
While the Asaf Jahi dynasty eventually lost
control of Hyderabad, the wrestlers are
still going strong. Today, inside the
Walled City, there are 250 kulcha shops
within a mere 10-km radius and they are
always teeming with foodies.
|
Today, Atma Ram’s grandson and Nathu Ram’s
son Harish Kumar runs the establishment.
They have stuck to tradition, keeping the
kulcha oval-shaped and stuffing it with
potatoes, mint, green cardamom, khada masala
and ground garam masala. The only compromise
is an olive oil version for health-conscious
tourists but then again, they don’t taste as
good as the original.
In fact, if you are planning a trip make
sure you go there between 8AM and 2PM. A
kulcha costs Rs 50 per piece, the unlimited
chana is complimentary and the taste
heavenly. So next time you’re in Amritsar,
make sure you go with an open mind and an
empty stomach, and you’ll be in a
gastronomic heaven.
All the Eating Joints Mentioned in
This Newsletter
1) Kesar Da Dhaba
2) Yellow Chilli
Restaurant
3) Brothers Amritsari
Dhaba
4) Giani’s Tea Stall
5) Bharawan Da Dhaba
6) Gian Di Hatti
7) Pehalwan Kulcha Shop
8) Rana’s Fruit Cream
9) Chawlas
10) Beera Chicken House
11) Surjit Food Plaza
12) Pal Da Dhaba
13) Friends Dhaba
14) Makhan Fish and Chicken
Corner
|
|
|
A quick reference to easy recipes, drawn
from Slurrp’s library of over 300,000 food
prep options, with the lowdown on the one
ingredient around which a dish is built.
|
Food journeys that take a turn for the
unexpected. Serendipity guides these
down-the-rabbit-hole explorations: who
knows, poee might just lead
to misal pav.
|
|
In-depth, well-researched narratives about
food. From the evolution of mock meats, to
the cuisine of Gondal's royal kitchen,
you’ll find a food story that keeps you
hooked.
|
These stories and recipes celebrate a vital
part of Indian festivals: food. And our
editors will even line up star chefs to
share their holiday cooking secrets
with you.
|
|
|
Hindustan Media Ventures
Limited,
Hindustan Times House,
18-20,
Second Floor, Kasturba
Gandhi
Marg, New Delhi - 110 001, India
|
|
|
If you need
any guidance or support along the way,
please send
an email to
slurrp@htmedialabs.com. We’re here to
help!
|
©️2021 Slurrp,
HT Media Labs. All rights
reserved.
|
|
|
|
