This Indian chef's 2 Michelin-starred restaurant is really popular

Two Michelin stars and one unique brand of food-"Cal-Indian"-later, chef Srijith Gopinath has much to celebrate about. Not only does his restaurant enjoy cult status in the San Francisco Bay Area, but currently he is the only Indian in the US with two Michelin stars. Family and nostalgia have helped shape his concept of food, which he insists does not involve reinventing Indian flavours, but simply taking basic, traditional flavours and making them accessible by cooking and presenting them in a Californian format.

"Our cuisine is playful and many of the dishes awaken one's childhood memories if one grew up in India," he adds. "Today we celebrate the concept of "farm to table" but I remember as a child, waking up in the middle of paddy fields and coconut groves. My day began by watching a bucket of frothy milk, from our own cows, being brought to our front door. Rarely did we buy vegetables, poultry or eggs; everything from rice, cereals and even black pepper came from our own farms.

So 'farm to table' for me was never a food fad but a way of life growing up." The chef, who grew up eating typical Malayalee and Tamil food, recalls how his late grandmother would coordinate with the milk man, coconut picker and farm workers before deciding on the menu. "Understanding food, cooking and enjoying it is something that comes naturally even though I never dreamt about being a chef until I went to college," he says. Today he is executive chef at Campton Place Restaurant, at San Francisco's Taj Campton Place hotel. The chef, who describes himself as a "simple and humorous guy", shares his favourites: dreams, influences and stories.

A few of my favourite things

Top ingredients: Basil, coconut, cilantro, eggs

Most memorable dish: Poached lobster with coconut curry sauce

Food gadget that you can't do without: Sharp knife

Most versatile ingredient: Onion

Favourite chefs: Daniel Humm, Dan Barber, Floyd Cardoz

Favourite restaurants across the world: No such thing

Top five sources of inspiration: Mom, mother in law, farmers' markets, fellow chefs and street food

Country on your wishlist for a culinary tour: India and Spain

Favourite food dream: Honestly, I tweaked my dreams as I grew up and I will continue to make changes as I move on. But as of today my dream is to change people's perception about Indian food as "spicy hot cheap food" (especially abroad) and give it the recognition it deserves. Fortunately I am not alone in this fight; India has an immense pool of talent.

Earliest food memory: Cooking in my joint family kitchen back home, watching bundles of paddy grain been brought in, picking black pepper from our back yard with my grandmother and loading tapioca on to our bullock cart to drop off to the local market.

Early influences: Watching my late grandmother cook in our home kitchen for the entire joint family; especially late at night I used to watch her make palm sugar, simmering palm nectar for hours and hours. By next morning I would see them reduced to palm sugar domes, delicious ready to eat. In some way, it did have some effect in paving the way to what I ended up doing in life.

How did you venture into the food industry? Purely by chance, like most Indian children, I wanted to be an engineer but since I did not get into the engineering school of my choice, my next option was to do either business management or hotel management. I chose the latter and that is where I came across food and cooking in a professional avatar. I fell in love and have never looked back since. So here I am cooking, cooking and cooking...

Flavour and texture versus plating and overall look and feel: Everything in the right order-flavour, texture and then look and feel.

Fusion Indian: I promise you that this phrase was not cooked up by a chef; it is a media composition to look and sound exotic. I really don't think these words have any significance. If you're asking my opinion on bringing the essence of two cuisines together, I'd say yes but it raises many questions like where you are doing it and what you are doing with the ingredients. I would avoid fusing things which do not fuse well together, yet I have seen it yield superb results. Again, it caters and satisfies to an adventurous audience but it's definitely not for everyone.

Worst dish you have ever cooked: Fish curry with smoked onions in it; simply did not work at all.

Gamut of emotions you experienced when you won the two Michelin stars: Pure excitement; I wrote an email to my colleagues since no one was around at home. Even though it was very early in the morning, within an hour or so I had the entire staff around, yelling all over the kitchen and we popped some champagne.

Your experience under the tutelage of chefs Raymond Blanc and Gary Jones at the two-Michelin starred Le Manoir Aux Quat' Saisons in Oxfordshire, England: It was one of the most inspiring times of my career. Simple basics of cooking, discipline and solid kitchen manners are some of the best things I learned there.

Advantages of working in a state where golden produce abounds: Living in California is a blessing; superb ingredients change seasonally. This is early autumn and we have just started seeing root vegetables and pumpkins and persimmons in the market.