The changing menus of small towns

NAGPUR: For restaurateur Ashok Hansles, changing customer demand has been food for thought off late. Times change, and so do tastes, he has realised — even in Nagpur.
One evening, he recalls, a young woman who wanted to do a take-away seemed miffed  with the menu and proceeded to offer him a litany of the kind of dishes she’d have liked on the menu of  the  ‘Ashoka’, the up-market food joint that Hansles has been running for 50 years.

The lady wanted Thai and Malaysian cuisine and Hansles was at a loss for words. Who’d want that kind of cuisine here, he wondered? That’s was the day he kicked off a radical transformation of his hotel that had only served Maharashtrian food.

With a little help from Nagpur’s well-known chef Vishnu Manohar, the Ashoka is now set for a major menu-makeover. Hansles has roped in chef from Mumbai who is now training local cooks in ‘authentic continental dishes’ previously unheard of in Nagpur.
What’s happening in Nagpur, a tier-2 city is happening in other towns too.  “I like to try dishes that we don’t normally eat at home?” asks Ankita, a customer at Ten Downing Street.

Changing lifestyles, she insists, may be at the root of changing food habits. “I work five days so I eat out with friends over the weekends.”  Her menu at home is decided by her cook, a north Indian. “My daily food is a fusion of Maharashtrian and north-Indian dishes, “ she said.

“People’s tastes for a variety of food - from local to continental, are changing,” says Manohar, who has wrutten cooking books. Change is also visible at wedding receptions.  “We just catered to party where the menu comprised Indian and continental dishes,” says Manohar. Food aficionados’ craving for newer culinary choices is driven by many factors that are the result of liberalsisation. As Manohar explains, “People who return from foreign trips want to know if they can get those dishes here,” Manohar now wants to host a Thai and Italian food festival later this year.

Awareness about continental cuisine has come via the  Internet and TV.   Anil Joshi, an IT professional whose wife is Gujarati, eats either fast or junk food every evening. “We have sandwiches, khichri, or noodles whichever is convenient,” he says.  For the Joshis, a Maharashtrian family, easy-to-cook food is a matter of convenience. Interestingly, this has had an influence over their neighbours too, who tried making fast food at home with some tips from the Joshis.

Nagpur’s traditional food is spicy. Migrants who come here for work relish it, says the  owner of a Saoji-joint, a  dhaba serving  non-vegetarian fare.

South Indian food has also made inroads. Over the last five years, several roadside ‘Anna’ joints have come up that provide idlis and dosas. College-student Vinay Mehta, who’s studying engineering says,”This stall gives me an option for a quick, healthy and affordable food.”