Hotels in Mussoorie tempt guests with Garhwali food

MUSSOORIE: As the tourist season draws near and Mussoorie gears up to welcome visitors during the Dussehra holidays, many hotels in the hill station are preparing to tempt guests with Garhwali cuisine which hitherto was not a significant part of hotel menus. From stinging nettle kebabs to pataud (colocasia leaf rolls in chick pea batter) to an authentic Garhwali thali, a number of luxury hotels have taken the cue to promote local food.Some are also fusing Garhwali food with other dishes and creating experimental fare like jhangora sandwich layered with ice cream.
“Garhwali cuisine is a cuisine which not many would have tasted. So we decided to introduce a Garhwali thali, complete with thichwani, aloo jakhiya, chainsu, phanu, meetha bhaat, jhangore ki kheer, kode ki roti etc in our menu,” says Sunil Kumar, chef at JW Marriott hotel. He adds that since most of the dishes are new for the guests, they are often accompanied by “interesting tales from the hills.” “Many guests are curious to know about our dishes like kandali (stinging nettle), gauth ki daal, chainsu etc. So we tell them them about the preparation and tales associated with the dishes,” says Kumar.
According to Anil Sharma, vice president of Jaypee Residency Manor, which was among the first to introduce Garhwali cuisine to guests, and which recently incorporated a Cutting chai and Garhwali snacks theme in their menu, Garhwali dishes “are healthy and nutritious and are therefore emerging as popular options.”
Besides serving traditional dishes in their authentic form, a few of the hotels have also dabbled in a bit of experimenting.
“While we serve authentic Garhwali dishes like gauth ki daal and kandali ka saag, we thought it would also be interesting to do some innovations. So we came up with kandali cheese kabab and kandali almond, a thick broth made of green kandali paste tempered with garlic and finished with roasted almonds. Our guests are loving it,” says Arun Dabral, general manager, Brentwood Hotel.
Chef Firoz Ahmed Qureshi of Saffron Leaf Hotel who won an award at last year’s Uttrakhandi food festival for his dishes, says innovation is the key to present Garhwali cuisine to a wider audience. “I believe innovation always gets that extra attention to any cuisine. Also it makes it more acceptable to a wider audience.” Qureshi’s interpretation of the cuisine comes with a twist. For example, he made jhangora halwa, stuffed it in choliya roti and tempered it with reduction of buransh and maalta juice.
“All authentic Garhwali ingredients when presented in an interesting format make for an irresistible combination,” he says. A case in point, he adds is a recipe with a twist — kababs made of gauth dal and jhangora sandwich layered with ice cream which was “a big hit.”