The Chef with a zing
Chef Manoj Vasaikar's restaurant Indian Zing has been getting some of the most notable reviews of any Indian restaurant in recent years. Humayun Husain catches with him.
When an unassuming west London Indian restaurant quietly starts to get the kind of rave reviews that even a high profile restaurant couldn't muster then you know that something very right is going on here. The restaurant is Indian Zing and like any restaurant drawing attention, the secret behind its success is its chef - Manoj Vasaikar.
Here is what Fay Maschler, one of several of the country's top critics to have slapped plaudits at Indian Zing, had to say:" Manoj sees the way Indian food is going - designer plates and an emphasis on lightness - but doesn't lose sight of flavour of what we all like about going out for an Indian."
Lightness of touch is very much inherent in Manoj's cooking because he's a Mumbai-born Maharashtran, an Indian region, where despite abundant use of spicing, the food has never over-burdened the stomach. When we meet, Manoj has just finished holding a Maharashtran food festival at Indian Zing. But even in his much-praised a la carte menu, Manoj has endeavoured to feature dishes with Maharashtran influences, utilising lots of yogurt, coconut, jaggery and fresh herbs.
"What I want to give customers at Indian Zing," says the 45-year-old Manoj,"was an overall sense of well-being. Even the interior has been designed using the Vastu Shastra principal, which is the Sanskrit term for dwelling which has been constructed to create harmonious balance between man and nature."
But this sense of spiritualism is not only in the restaurant with its various Indian artefacts and pictures, but also something that is part of parcel of Manoj himself. And to think this is someone who wanted to be a pilot in the Indian Air Force when he was growing up in Mumbai!
Yet he failed his test twice so what has left was a choice between going to catering college or getting into textile engineering. He chose the former if only because the college was close to his home.
"I was in the first year of my hotel management course," states Manoj, "and I suddenly realised that I was thoroughly enjoying the cooking aspect of it. I was only 18 at the time.I'd never in my life till then been cutting, chopping, or slaved over a hot stove! Though i'd always liked my mother's cooking, even she didn't have any influence over me. To this day, i'm not sure why i was doing well at it or why i was fascinated with cooking."
Having done well enough, stints with both the Taj and the Oberoi group followed, staying for a year at the latter's renowned hotel restaurant, kandahar. As luck would have it, London would soon beckon.
Camellia and Namita Punjabi - of Veeraswamy, Amaya and Masala Zone fame were scouting at the time for chefs for their upcoming venture, Chutney Mary. With a handful of chefs shortlisted, Manoj won through and was brought over by them to London as the restaurant's chef de partie and then promoted as its deputy head chef. After that he progressed on to becoming Veeraswamy's head chef.
"I learnt a lot from the two sisters", admits Manoj" and both are very astute in the intricacies of spicing and selecting quality ingredients."
Yet it wasn't till the late '90s that Manoj decided to branch out on his own and he did it in style. He opened a restaurant called India 2000 in Esher, Surrey, as a reference to the upcoming millennium with the establishment immediately hailed by several critics as one of the most innovative at the time. With preplated food, organic ingredients - something Manoj himself champions-and stylish decor, it was not to last.
Readily admitting that he was a little naive of the restaurant business then, Manoj's endeavour failed.
He soldiered on with chef consultancy gigs until in 2002, he launched just India, in southwest London. The critics were again behind him and it was here that Manoj combined his knowledge of traditional and modern India cooking. But he fell foul of the business yet again though an even worse personal blow was to follow when his mother, who had become so proud of his career, passed away.
Then last year he opened Indian Zing.
"Fot the first two to three months of opening." states Manoj, i was losing money and almost regretted launching another restaurant. But then the reviews started to come out and i was bowled over not only by them, but also the public reaction. I was just getting packed out and that's still happening to this day.
I think i've achieved the right equilibrium of the practical and the contemporary in my menu here. i'm a great believer in taking ingredients from anywhere and using them for indian cooking. I don't think there should be any barriers so long as the strength of the saucing and the right balance of spicing are there in the food. I also like simplicity, being able to talk to customers and gradually take my restaurant to a new level each year."
