It's easy to forget there's a fierce January wind whipping outside Rohan Kamicheril's toasty Brooklyn kitchen, where a pot of rasam bubbles gently on the stove. The 33-year-old chef is busy assembling the hors d'oeuvre course—a persimmon-cucumber-mango chaat—to a hearty menu for The Tiffin Club, a New York-based dinner series that Kamicheril, a former editor, has hosted alongside his partner, publicist Mike Jesson, for two years. The supper club, described by Kamicheril as a “showcase for regional Indian food—with the occasional detour,” occurs almost monthly in the couple's Cobble Hill apartment, a dimly-lit space with towering bookshelves, framed vintage travel ads, and vases of fresh lilies.
In just a few minutes, we'll be joined by 11 other diners: fellow urban creatives, including a coterie of translators (former colleagues from Kamicheril's six-year stint steering Words Without Borders, an online magazine for world literature), a papermaker and an up-and-coming sculptor. They're all eager to dig into tonight's five-course meal that's inspired by a decidedly milder Indian winter.
“The popular conception of winter food [in America] is that it has to be very fatty or starchy,” said Kamicheril, who arrived in Yonkers, New York, from his native Bengaluru to attend Sarah Lawrence College nearly 15 years ago. “Growing up in Bangalore, I still had access to all this amazing produce even in the colder months,” he revealed. “And a lot of the things you would eat during a Bangalore winter are things that would cheer you up in New York City, too.”
The evening's dishes are testaments to that nomadic sentiment: daikon-filled chapati dumplings that float on the aforementioned rasam; warm brussels sprouts seasoned with piquant green chile chamandi (think South Indian pesto), khakhra croutons and shavings of pecorino sardo; fried idlis on a bed of sliced green grapes; khichdi topped with roasted carrots and a quivering, blistered egg. Kamicheril prefaces each course with a snappy introduction, though he admits that he “tries to keep the background information to an essential minimum.” For dessert, there's a delightfully airy green mango tart. And Jesson, who plays sommelier and mixologist, ensures the wines, which range from a floral Grüner Veltliner to an earthy Rioja Crianza, are impeccably paired.
Tonight's offerings are entirely vegetarian—“it's partly because everyone's palates are so sated after indulging during the holidays,” Kamicheril explained—though The Tiffin Club's past menus have paid homage to subcontinental seafood and a variety of Anglo-Indian gems like sorpotel, a slow-cooked pork dish spiked with vinegar, and an herbaceous mulligatawny, which are nods to Kamicheril's own cultural heritage. Like the club's stainless steel namesake, which can house a stackable, mix-and-match meal, Kamicheril's monthly dinners celebrate seemingly disparate dishes. “We want [the dishes] to be amenable to each other even if they come from wildly different places,” he described. “The tiffin is the perfect little container for ideas,” he continued. “And that thought really struck home.”
In early February, Kamicheril will pack his bags for a six-week culinary journey that criss-crosses Karnataka. He'll be gathering intel for an upcoming book on South Indian breakfast traditions (incidentally, another successful Tiffin Club theme), in addition to visiting relatives' homes to add to his expanding repertoire. “The internet is a great resource for finding out how people cook but there's no substitute to being in a kitchen,” he said, remembering an afternoon he once spent with a fastidious home cook who shared her recipe for the regional classic, brinjal rice, aka vaangi bhaath. “I tried explaining that I wouldn't have access to the narrow green eggplants—the specific ones you have to use for the dish—in New York,” he recalled. “And she said in that case, just don't make vaangi bhaath,” he added, laughing. “There's something to be said for that kind of rigour, but I don't have the luxury to indulge in that. In New York, we try to make things that don't necessarily taste authentic,” he said, “but they taste delicious.”
To learn more about The Tiffin Club's upcoming dinner schedule, visit Onceuponatiffin.com