The search for the perfect 'shorshe bata'

I'm sitting at Hangla's, a Bengali fast food eatery in Malad, when a middle-aged man approaches proprietor Soumitra Ghosh. He starts out, quite politely. “I love the food here, but there's something missing,” he says. “Have you ever considered selling phuchka and jhalmuri as well? I think they would be a huge hit in Mumbai.”

Anyone with a Kolkata association would know that the man (let's call him Mr Banerjee) is referring to two kinds of street food unique to Bengal which have never quite been replicated anywhere else: phuchka is a spicy equivalent of pani puri, and jhalmuri is spicy puffed rice.

 When Ghosh says he will think about it, Mr Banerjee becomes insistent. “I don't think you realise how much we miss phuchkas (a fiery equivalent of the pani puri), beguni (an eggplant bhajiya) and aloor chop (a braised potato dumpling). You could easily get a phuchkawallah from Kolkata and set him up in a corner of your shop. He can also sell other snacks. You'll get double the number of customers,” he presses on, clearly unwilling to leave the shop till Ghosh gives in. It takes a long time, and many assurances, to finally send him on his way with his food parcel.

When it comes to food, the Bengali can be quite persistent and picky. Unfortunately, Mumbai's Bengalis can be neither, since the city has very few eateries on offer. And they are either too expensive, or take-out places that are yet to serve full-fledged meals.

The quality, too, varies. For a people that take eating seriously, this is nothing less than a tragedy. “We are restless souls because of this,” says Anjan Chatterjee, the high priest of Bengali cuisine, who put hundreds of daab chingri and bhapa ilish-craving foodies in Mumbai out of their misery when he opened Only Fish, and later Oh Calcutta!

“When I came to Mumbai many years ago, I’d run around on Sunday afternoons trying to find some kosha mangsher jhol (mutton curry), but of course I didn't. I even tried substitutes at Irani cafes, but nothing came close. I decided then, that if I ever have the means, I will open a Bengali restaurant and satisfy the souls of fellow Bengalis in Mumbai.” Chatterjee took it a step further and opened Sweet Bengal, an outlet of desserts so that “nobody can pass off Gujarati mithai as sandesh”.

Bengalis are not too entrepreneurial, which probably explains why the number of eateries hasn't kept up with a growing population. “My Bengali patrons tell me they wanted to start a restaurant too,” says Ghosh of Hangla's. “But the high rents and accommodation for cooks brought in from Kolkata, to keep the food authentic, is a hassle.”

Till a few years ago, eateries proliferated in Bengali neighbourhoods like Kandivili (East) and Vashi. But they shut down just as fast. “I used to frequent a fast food place which also served greasy Chinese, the kind you find in Kolkata pushcarts. But the outlet changed location so many times, I lost track,” says Kandivili resident Shubham Das.

Now Oshiwara, Lokhandwala and Seven Bungalows boast the largest concentration of Bengali eatries in town -- The Calcutta Club, Kolkata Konnection, Hooghly and Hangla's -- thanks to the large number of Bengalis from the entertainment and IT industries living here.

In fact, patronage comes from unexpected places. When food consultant Ujjal Das Gupta took over the Prithvi Café in 1994, it was actor Shashi Kapoor who insisted Bengali fare be added to the menu. “He said: When will we get to eat all those delicious dishes you cook at home?” says Das Gupta. “So we included chholar dal, sweet pulao, patoler dolma and kosha mangsho, and they were a success though they are no longer on offer.”

Today Bengali eateries are either fancy restaurants or street-corner joints, says Das Gupta. “There's nothing in between, like an informal, sit-down place where you can entertain people,” he says. It’s also sad that a rich, nuanced cuisine has had to be simplified into basic slots like fine dining, street and home cooked food, and not a single place in town offers all three together, he adds.