Gourmet cuisine to streetside snacks: The meals that made 2014

KUNAL VIJAYKAR
Choosing the three best dishes that I have had in the year is like trying to single out your favourite child. It smacks of undue favoritism, discrimination and partisanship. Thankfully I have no kids, so I am saved the dishonour of being churlish, unscrupulous and unfair.
The year 2014 brought many new flavours to my table. These three stand out, not because they are the absolute best, or because they are unique, but because I encountered them for the first time in this year.
It's impossible to get a good burger in Mumbai. It's so difficult that I have actually cultivated my palette to enjoy the humble burger at Kobe (Chowpatty) for the last 30 years. It's nothing more than a charred cutlet between a buttered bun, with a few raw onion rings and a bit of mustard. But I like it. Or I did, until 212 Bar and Grill in Worli launched burgers on their menu. The pulled pork belly burger with barbeque sauce and melted cheese is astonishing. The meat is well cooked, not stringy, the homemade barbecue sauce has just enough sweetness, tartness complexity and flavour, and the cheese and grill gives you that smokiness that a good burger makes. They also do the classic tenderloin version with cheddar, caramelized onions and crispy bacon that hits the mark.
Busaba at Colaba has become a staple go-to for a reasonably priced Asian meal. Can you believe South Mumbai has pretty much no Pan-Asian restaurants where you can eat under a Rs 1,000 per head? So while Busaba is famously known for their Burmese Khao Suay, hidden deep in their menu is a gem. Korean Beef Bulgogi. It's strips of meat, marinated in soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic and spice and then fired on a grill. Busaba serves it with a thick, sticky, robust chilly paste. You've got to smear just a blob of this potent sauce on your strips to make the flavours jump off your plate into your mouth. It's one of those dishes that doesn't make you feel fat and slumberous.
Everyone swears by the chaat in Delhi, the kachoris in Jaipur and the deep-fried early morning breakfast at Varanasi. I swear by the khasta kachori at Tewari Bros at Sion or Opera House. It's basically an oversized, crisp puri. I have measured it. It's larger, rounder and better looking than my face. With a deft finger, the man behind the counter, cracks open the top, making a large hole. The flakes from top descend to the bottom of the cavernous kachoris. Now the kachori is ready to be stuffed. Much like in a "dahi batata puri," the Mumbai version is filled with a stuffing of sprouted moong, masalas, potato, sweet tamarind and green mint chutney and doused in dahi. It's the dahi that gives Tewari's kachoris it's edge. The dahi is sweetened and whipped to creaminess and then dripped all over the big fat puri.
— Kunal Vijayakar is a food-loving TV host, actor and director

ROSHNI BAJAJ-SANGHVI
Malagasy meal at Chez Sucett's in Antananarivo (Madagascar): A proper Malagasy meal starts with an array of condiments alongside crusty bread and chips. One could either call it an elaborate amuse bouche, or a decked out bread basket. And of course, there has to be some vanilla and canelle rhum arrangé. The array at Chez Sucett's was spectacular. There was tomato salad with kombava zest and juice; smoked eggplant with onions, lime and pepper; crunchy stir-fried veggies with ginger and turmeric; shredded marinated cucumber; and fiery green sakay.
Greek salad in Greece: This may seem obvious, but it spoiled me for Greek salad anywhere else. There, it's the purest expression of excellent local ingredients. Every bite sings. The tomatoes make other tomatoes taste like cardboard mush. The cucumbers are deeply fragrant. And Greek olive oil is good enough to glug.
Hurda party in Aurangabad: A week ago, my friends Radhika and Saurabh Dhoot invited us to their home in Aurangabad for our first hurda party. Tender, green jowar (sorghum) is called hurda in Marathi, and ponkh in Gujarati. It is only available for a couple of months in the year every month. Hurda farmers roast the grain, hand thresh it stalk by stalk, before handing palmfuls of the sweet, nutty, smoky seeds to eaters. It is served with four spicy chutneys (coconut, garlic, peanut, wood apple), jaggery, sesame chikki, and fresh, thick yogurt. This was easily one of my most memorable meals of 2014.
—Roshni Bajaj-Singhvi is a food writer

ANTOINE LEWIS
This has been a year of great meals for me. These three stand out over the many others.
Ottimo, ITC Gardenia: I have no reservations in saying that the best Italian meal I've had in my life has been at Ottimo. While other Italian restaurants are caught up with ideas of provenance and tradition, Ottimo takes on a completely novel approach to Italian food. Chef Vittorio throws caution to the wind as he tricks the eyes and the palate with a refreshingly new style of presentation and plating.
My first course, Just like Tuna, had me confused — red-run looking pieces of meat were coated with sesame seeds, served with plum-looking sauce and chopsticks was what I'd expect from the hotels Japanese restaurant Edo. It was a trick. The 'sashimi' turned out to be perfectly cubed, compressed watermelon and the sauce, a balsamic reduction. Next up was an ice cream on a stick arranged on a carved block of ice. The ice cream, however was a balsamic and foie gras ice cream! Unfortunately, after the foie gras ban, Chef Vittorio had to remove this gem from the menu. Spaghetti with tomato and cheese is ubiquitous; when you're served the Sorrentina sphere at Ottimo, you get a big crusted ball on a soup. Cut the mozzarella ball and out tumbles a spaghetti pomodro with basil that's hidden inside.
Alamgir, Lucknow: Tunday Kababi may be the most famous restaurant in Lucknow, but if you want a really good Lucknowi meal, skip the tourist magnet and hunt for Alamgir. Bang opposite Tunday, hidden in a narrow pathway between two buildings, with no easily visible signage, you really need to hunt for Alamgir. I wouldn't have bothered if it hadn't been recommended by Chef Imtiaz Qureshi, the man who put Lucknowi cuisine on the global map.
I didn't find better kebabs and breads anywhere else in Lucknow. The gilawati kebab here is soft and smooth as a pâté. You can taste the spice but you just can't feel it. They go perfectly with the orange-hued sheermal. Normally, it's the main course that gets all the attention but what surprised me at Amlagir was the kulcha. I have never eaten kulchas that were so light and had the flakiness of a puff pastry. The excellent meaty, glistening with oil, nalli nihari, I was eating it with didn't stand a chance against the kulcha.
Janaseva Bhojnalay, Pune: Mumbai may be the hot bed of Maharashtrian politics but if you want great Maharashtrian food, then you need to head over to Pune. One of the best home-style, vegetarian thalis I've eaten was at Janaseva. Like most thali establishments, there's not much by way of décor. The dining room is basic and functional — three rows of 4-seater, laminate-topped, bench-tables run down the length of the well-lit room. The food was simple, but incredibly tasty. We were served was a black sesame thecha, a simple lovely varan, a bitter-sweet fried bhindi and coconut, a sweetish pumpkin bhaji, amazingly soft chapattis and a really nice preparation of chawli. Needless to say, we had several refills.
—Antoine Lewis is a food writer