Indian cuisine is yet to hit the sweet spot in the fiercely competitive food markets in the United States and Canada, but Indians seem to have found greater success in talking about food to television audiences in both countries. The visibility of Indian faces on popular food shows has been growing in recent months.
NEW YORK, NY - JUNE 05: Padma Lakshmi enjoys her signature Nespresso Vanilla Coffee with Caramel Milk Froth in …Padma Lakshmi, 41, the Chennai-born model and cookbook author, has been a host of Top Chef USA on the cable channel Bravo for eight seasons. The reality programme featuring contests among chefs is the top ranked food show in the US, pulling in around two million viewers for every episode. Earlier this year, the partly Indian, Canadian model and actor Lisa Ray, 40, joined the programme's Canadian franchise, Top Chef Canada. There's no doubt both hosts are expected to push up the glamour quotient, but they are also foodies in their own right. Padma Lakshmi is the author of two cookbooks; Toronto-based Lisa proudly recalls how she learnt to make parathas and makki di roti in a village near Chandigarh while preparing for her role in Deepa Mehta's film Water.
While Top Chef caters to more mainstream tastes, the hosts get plenty of opportunity to talk about their own culinary interests. "I aim to use the platform that Top Chef Canada has given me to talk about my passion for Indian cuisine," says Lisa, adding her favourite memories revolve around food, be it prawn dishes from Kochi, or parathas and kali dal at dhabas on the drive from Delhi to Dharamshala.
Now, there are also now shows dedicated to Indian cuisine on US and Canadian television. Two years ago, 33-year-old Mumbai native and Los Angeles resident Aarti Sequeira won Season 6 of The Next Food Network Star, earning her own show. She now hosts Aarti Party, where she teaches viewers how to put an Indian spin on popular American dishes. Her pretzel-fried steak with mango-onion gravy, for instance, calls for mango chutney, ground coriander, cumin and kasoori methi, all of which, she informs her viewers, can be found at Indian stores.
Another Indian face is the Vancouver-based Bal Arneson, who fronts Spice Goddess on the Food Network's Cooking Channel. The show, which explains the use of Indian spices and herbs, is currently in its second season. Arneson, who grew up in a village near Phagwara in Punjab and is in her late 30s, also has two cookbooks out and is working on her third. She urges viewers to experiment with masalas in Italian meatballs and even in the good old macaroni and cheese, and cooked up a cardamom-flavoured crème brulèe. "When I talk of my stories from growing up in India, I try to incorporate those stories within the food and people really like that," says Arneson, who sometimes lapses into her native Punjabi or Hindi during her shows, inviting audiences to "aa jao, aa jao, khaa lo".
Viewers in North America also get a taste of Indian cuisine with a growing number of chefs making their appearance as contestants on various reality shows. Mumbai-born chef Floyd Cardoz famously won the Top Chef Masters contest in 2011 with his version of the humble upma. Maneet Chauhan, executive chef of the New York and Chicago eatery Vermilion, and famous pastry chef and restaurant owner Jehangir Mehta have competed on Iron Chef.
All this on-screen visibility, however, probably overstates the popularity of Indian food in this part of the world. Except for isolated success stories, the cuisine is yet to break into the big leagues in either the mass market or luxury segments. There are highly rated chefs at Michelin-starred restaurants, such as Hemant Mathur at Tulsi, Vikas Khanna at Junoon and Avtar Walia at Tamarind Tribeca, all in New York. But as Mathur explains, it's important to think small when it comes to Indian food-Tulsi has just 70 covers. Cardoz would agree. Tabla, the most famous Indian restaurant in the US since it opened in 1998, closed shop in December 2010, with its owner, New York restaurateur Danny Meyer, conceding it was difficult to fill 263 seats each night. Cardoz, 50, who introduced and popularised modern Indian cuisine to Americans at Tabla, is now the executive chef at the North End Grill in New York.
Indian food hasn't found much favour in the mass market either, compared to other ethnic cuisines like Chinese, Mexican, Thai or Middle Eastern, all of which can be found at food courts in malls or airports across the US.
Krishnendu Ray, assistant professor of nutrition and food studies at New York University, puts this down to simple demographics. "Naan is not going to become the next pizza, not in our lifetime," declares Ray, adding it would take 10 million Indians to come to the US and spend a hundred years here before achieving a critical mass that can support mass expansion of Indian food. Ray studies New York's Indian restaurants from a sociological perspective and is the co-author of Curried Cultures-Food Globalization in South Asia. He points out, however, that Indian food has entered the vocabulary of cutting-edge American cuisine, partly due to the efforts of leading Indian chefs in the US, as well as its visibility on television shows.
For now, fans of Indian cuisine are hoping success on the small screen will give it more sizzle in American kitchens and on restaurant menus.
NEW YORK, NY - JUNE 05: Padma Lakshmi enjoys her signature Nespresso Vanilla Coffee with Caramel Milk Froth in …Padma Lakshmi, 41, the Chennai-born model and cookbook author, has been a host of Top Chef USA on the cable channel Bravo for eight seasons. The reality programme featuring contests among chefs is the top ranked food show in the US, pulling in around two million viewers for every episode. Earlier this year, the partly Indian, Canadian model and actor Lisa Ray, 40, joined the programme's Canadian franchise, Top Chef Canada. There's no doubt both hosts are expected to push up the glamour quotient, but they are also foodies in their own right. Padma Lakshmi is the author of two cookbooks; Toronto-based Lisa proudly recalls how she learnt to make parathas and makki di roti in a village near Chandigarh while preparing for her role in Deepa Mehta's film Water.While Top Chef caters to more mainstream tastes, the hosts get plenty of opportunity to talk about their own culinary interests. "I aim to use the platform that Top Chef Canada has given me to talk about my passion for Indian cuisine," says Lisa, adding her favourite memories revolve around food, be it prawn dishes from Kochi, or parathas and kali dal at dhabas on the drive from Delhi to Dharamshala.
Now, there are also now shows dedicated to Indian cuisine on US and Canadian television. Two years ago, 33-year-old Mumbai native and Los Angeles resident Aarti Sequeira won Season 6 of The Next Food Network Star, earning her own show. She now hosts Aarti Party, where she teaches viewers how to put an Indian spin on popular American dishes. Her pretzel-fried steak with mango-onion gravy, for instance, calls for mango chutney, ground coriander, cumin and kasoori methi, all of which, she informs her viewers, can be found at Indian stores.
Another Indian face is the Vancouver-based Bal Arneson, who fronts Spice Goddess on the Food Network's Cooking Channel. The show, which explains the use of Indian spices and herbs, is currently in its second season. Arneson, who grew up in a village near Phagwara in Punjab and is in her late 30s, also has two cookbooks out and is working on her third. She urges viewers to experiment with masalas in Italian meatballs and even in the good old macaroni and cheese, and cooked up a cardamom-flavoured crème brulèe. "When I talk of my stories from growing up in India, I try to incorporate those stories within the food and people really like that," says Arneson, who sometimes lapses into her native Punjabi or Hindi during her shows, inviting audiences to "aa jao, aa jao, khaa lo".
Viewers in North America also get a taste of Indian cuisine with a growing number of chefs making their appearance as contestants on various reality shows. Mumbai-born chef Floyd Cardoz famously won the Top Chef Masters contest in 2011 with his version of the humble upma. Maneet Chauhan, executive chef of the New York and Chicago eatery Vermilion, and famous pastry chef and restaurant owner Jehangir Mehta have competed on Iron Chef.
All this on-screen visibility, however, probably overstates the popularity of Indian food in this part of the world. Except for isolated success stories, the cuisine is yet to break into the big leagues in either the mass market or luxury segments. There are highly rated chefs at Michelin-starred restaurants, such as Hemant Mathur at Tulsi, Vikas Khanna at Junoon and Avtar Walia at Tamarind Tribeca, all in New York. But as Mathur explains, it's important to think small when it comes to Indian food-Tulsi has just 70 covers. Cardoz would agree. Tabla, the most famous Indian restaurant in the US since it opened in 1998, closed shop in December 2010, with its owner, New York restaurateur Danny Meyer, conceding it was difficult to fill 263 seats each night. Cardoz, 50, who introduced and popularised modern Indian cuisine to Americans at Tabla, is now the executive chef at the North End Grill in New York.
Indian food hasn't found much favour in the mass market either, compared to other ethnic cuisines like Chinese, Mexican, Thai or Middle Eastern, all of which can be found at food courts in malls or airports across the US.
Krishnendu Ray, assistant professor of nutrition and food studies at New York University, puts this down to simple demographics. "Naan is not going to become the next pizza, not in our lifetime," declares Ray, adding it would take 10 million Indians to come to the US and spend a hundred years here before achieving a critical mass that can support mass expansion of Indian food. Ray studies New York's Indian restaurants from a sociological perspective and is the co-author of Curried Cultures-Food Globalization in South Asia. He points out, however, that Indian food has entered the vocabulary of cutting-edge American cuisine, partly due to the efforts of leading Indian chefs in the US, as well as its visibility on television shows.
For now, fans of Indian cuisine are hoping success on the small screen will give it more sizzle in American kitchens and on restaurant menus.
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