The Land of Stone - An International Conference and a truly awesome Dakkhani meal!

Sometime in November 2015 my close buddy Abhijit told me about an International Conference being organised on the Pre-Colonial Deccan in Gulbarga in Jan 2016. So I jumped to it and demanded to be let in. The man organising the conference at the Central University  Karnataka (CUK) was the indefatigible Dr Nazrul Bari. he wrote in to me inviting me and I happily accepted. I was looking forward to meeting historians and others of my ilk in a place I had never visited before but which was in the top half of my bucket list of places to visit!

Gulbarga, today renamed Kalaburagi (kalla=stone + buragi=land in Kannada), or The Land of Stone was the original capital of the the Bahamani Sultanate formed when Hasan Gangu captured Daulatabad after Md. bin Tuglaq had abandoned it. 

Tuglaq had moved the whole of Delhi to the Deccan to centralise the capital of his Indian empire ... a brilliant idea but one he was unable to maintain. Hasan Gangu or Zafar Khan (as he had been renmaed by Khilji  was appointed governor of Daulatabad. According to one legend Hasan Gangu was the Turkic slave of an astrologer from Delhi called Gangu (Gangaram), another legend says he was actually a Brahmin who converted  to islam and hence named his dynasty after his previous caste affiliation - Bahmani! 

He ascended the throne with the regnal name  Abu'l Muzaffar Ala-ud-din Shah Bahamani and founded the Bahamani Sultanate in 1347AD. He was a bit vary of Daulatabad and its lure and moved his capital to Gulbarga where he built a beautiful fort. The Gulbarga Fort with its squat round bastions, stocky bartizans and oversized crennelations is the prototype of the Bhamani style of defence architecture and the precurcessor of almost all the defence architecture in the  Deccan for the next 400 years. The thick rounded bastions with bartizans offering a secure position for defending archers was a Turkish innovation and the style of architecture employed was also of Turkish or Saracening origins. The Bahamanis employed this with absolute aplomb and ensured virtually impregnable fortresses. The sucessors of Hasan Gangu soon spread outwards and soon the sultanate expanded. In 1425 Ad the capital was moved to Bidar. it was from the safety of Bidar that the Machhiavellian Primeminister Mahmud Gavan expanded the empire by reconquering Goa from the Vijayanagara kings.

Gulbarga was by then an inescapable part of the Deccan or Dakhan and has its own flavour of Urdu called Dakkhani as well as its Sufi mysticism thanks to the famous Sufi saint Khwaja Bande Nawaz.

I arrived at Gulbarga on the morning of the 13th of Jan and was picked up by a very courteous Md Rafique sent by Nazrul. He took me over to the Central Park Hotel where a lot of old friends from Deccan College were waiting for me. Abhijit, Ganvir, Joge, Guru and his wife Reshma were all present as was Tejas ... after a quick breakfast we were off to CUK. The Univ is about 25km away from the heart of Gulbarga and has a sprawlingly large modern campus. Nazrul and his able team of student volunteers had put together an absolutely lovely Conference. After the usual inauguration function we got down to the academic sessions. My paper was titled ' A Preliminary Report on the Medieval excavations at Chandore 2012-2015' was in the first session and was recieved very well. The rest of the day flowed into session after session and there were some amazing papers by old friends as well as a number of new folks (to me atleast). Abhijit Dandekar, Gwendolyn, Gopal Joge, Shrikant Ganvir, Reshma Sawant, Gurudas Shete and so many others read some really lovely papers.

After a full day Md rafique took us back via a friends tea shop where we had some of the finest meat and chicken samosas I have eaten. These looked just like the ubiquitous Punjabi samosa but were stuffed with nonveg goodness. The meat (read 'buffalo') samosa had a coarse mince flavoured with spices, mint and a touch of dill. The chicken samosa was a revelation. The filling was tiny cubes of chicken breast cooked to perfection in a simple onion, garlic and blak pepper base. 

That night we went off to a dinner hosted by the Conferences patron - the Karnataka Minister for Minorities. The food was nice but what sang in the entire meal was the Gulbarga version of Khubbani ka meetha (stewed dried apricots). 

Day two of the conference started with us taking off a bit late and on the way we spotted the outer walls of Gulbarga Fort. This was too good a chance to miss and we played truant from the conference for the next half an hour by asking our driver to take us around the firt. When we got to the main entrance he surprised us all by driving right in! The fort is still tenanted by a few families who claim decent from its original denizens. Inside was a slightly sad sight. The Gulbarga Jama Masjid was in good nick as was the central bastion ... the rest was in a sorry and dilapidated state. This mosque at Gulbarga is the greatest example of the Persian style of architecture and stands testimony to the master architects of the 14th c AD.

We raced off to CUK and to our surprise arrived just as the first paper of the days first academic session started! The day then proceeded in a whilwind with presentations by Tejas Garge, Abdul Aziz Rajput, Danish Moin, Rekha Pande and Anne Feldhaus amongst many many others. The day came to an end with a simple valedictory function where the VC of CUK announced the creation of a full department of History and Archaeology! Nazrul had pulled off a fantastic event.

Abdul Aziz Rajput speaking on Bahamani Architecture

Danish Moin speaking on Bahamani Coinage and its secular nature

Dr Rekha Pande delivering a very interestalk on the Tawaifs of Hyderabad

Dr Nazrul Bari wrapping up the Valedictory function

Abhijit and team left early that evening leaving tejas and me to fend for ourselves, We soon teamed up with Prof Ayub of Hyderabad and went of in search of the famous Gulbarga sweetmeat the Maal-Puri from the famous Mama Puri Mithai shop. Md Rafique came to the rescue and led us through a maze of small lanes to the treasure.

After dropping off Prof Ayub, Tejas and I asked Md Rafique to take us to eat at a place where he would and he took us down the lane from Bande Nawaz's Dargan to a small eatery called Nawaz!



The menu was limited to four main courses (actually just two) Gravy Chicken or Mutton and Biryani once again Chicken or Mutton. We orderd the Chicken Gravy with Rumali Rotis and one each of the Biryanis.

The chicken was cubed and boneless (to my surprise) but with a slightly punchy, smoky, creamy gravy with a soft silken texture. It had nuances on so many levels it surprised the hell out of me. The rotis were thin but soft not dry and went perfectly with the chicken. 

The Biryanis came next. Md rafique had very proudly proclaimed that this wasnt just the best in Gulbarga but better than any Biryani from Hyderabad. A claim that surprisingly was spot on. The Mutton Biryani was subtle, the meat soft and pink inside, the rice fragrant, separate but not dry, it was a Biryani of sublime proportions. It was served with a thin Curd raita and a kick-ass Mirchi ka salan. The Chicken biryani was completely different it was full of a fried onion birasta coating the succulent chicken (thankfuly on the bone) pieces that nestled in long grain rice cooked to perfection. The three of us were glubbed when the waiter suggested very strongly that we have dessert. When asked he said the options were (you guessed it!) two - Khubbani and Froot. We had had the Khubbani the previous nite so we opted for the Froot. I didnt expect much, boy was I overwhelmed. We got a very very subtle fruit salad with custard variant where the fruits had spent some time soaked in a mildly sweeted heavily reduced milk rabri. The milk had thickened further on being sucked in by the apples and the milk-macerated fruits were a sensual delight in the mouth. They put out the fires f the biryani and overlaid a gentle blanket of sweetness.

Chicken Biryani on top left Mutton on bottom right

.

The Froot!

We gently rolled out of Nawaz after paying a bill of Rs 692/-!

Later at the Hotel, Tejas and I contemplated moving to Gulbarga. Especially after Md. Rafique had regaled us with tales of a divinely inspired Nalli Nihari sold from 4.30am onwards outside the Dargah of Bande Nawaz which he swore was better than any other takers. After the biryani boast we were wont to taking him very seriously and I have promised I will be back to Gulbarga if not for anything else then for this. 

Tejas left for Aurangabad via Ahmednagar at midnite and I slept like a log till 7.45am ... when I rolled out of bed and almost directly onto the train to Mumbai.

Gulbarga left a mark on me, on both my academic interests and my palate, both far larger than I had expected. thank you Nazrul and Md Rafique and thank you Abhijit for roping me in.

Naushijaan - Lucknowi Tehzeeb comes to Mumbai

Last week Rhea and I were invited to eat and consult at a newly opened restaurant in the eastern suburbs ... but a sudden tragedy struck and their A/C unit conked out shutting down the entire restaurant, we were disappointed and decided to make our weary way home when I remembered seeing a a new restaurant claiming to serve Lucknowi delicacies on the Kurla-Ghatkopar Rd ... we did an immediate rethink and decided to redraw the days plan of action and turn towards this new eatery. 

To add to our desires was the fact that a common friend, foodie and food writer Kalyan (The Knife) Karmakar had been giving our taste-buds sleepless nights with his posts from his ongoing Food Safari in Lucknow  :)

Naushijaan (Lazzat-e-Lucknow) - is situated just off the Kurla-Ghatkopar LBS Marg, It is a low roofed eatery with wall to wall pictures of Lucknow's Architectural Heritage, the Nawabs of Lucknow and the various dishes made and served at the restaurant. The outside of the restaurant has a Ulta-tava parantha maker cum BBQ on one side and a tava for Galauti Kebabas and Tava Chicken on the other. It is mainly a no frills, non-luxury, A/c restaurant with its entire staff imported from Lucknow.

(Naushijaan is a chain of Lucknowi restaurants originating in Lucknow with franchisees/branches in Chandigarh, Kolkata, Coimbatore and now in Mumbai.)

They seated us at a table and immediately brought a small basin  with warm water and  an ewer for us to wash our hands with. This struck a perfect note with me.

We ordered (on recommendation) - The Galouti Kebabs, The Tava Chicken, The Mutton Parda Kebab Pasanda with Ulte Tave ke Paranthe. The chicken was really nice but not spectacular. The mutton was really rich, spicy, silken in texture and extremely flavourful. The Galouti kebabs on the other hand were really spectacular, they were redolent of pure ghee and the smell of fried meat, they had a nice crisp outside with a soft melt in the mouth inside. Galoutis I have eaten in 5 Star hotels have always tasted pasty and flat on the inside, these on the other hand had definite texture, extremely soft but not a complete paste, they were beautifully well seasoned and cardamom was the single strong note amongst many subdued ones. The Parantha was the perfect accompaniment.

 By the time we finished with the kebabs and chicken we realised all we had place for was the Biryani ... the saalans would have to wait for another time.

Our friendly waiter Radhe Singh recommended both the Pullao-style in Mutton as well as the Degh-style ... we cast caution to the winds and decided to call for one of each. The both arrived looking very similar with a beautifully shiny silver varakh on top, but they both tasted completely exquisite and different. The pullao was moist (a tad cold) and had a robust taste of onions and spices. The degh-style was drier and redolent with the aroma of the spices which had permeated not just the soft juicy shank of mutton but each and every grain of rice. The degh-style was the clear winner. The word for all Awadhi rice dishes is Pullao, Biryani is a word used outside the Awadhi/Lucknowi heartland. We barely ate a third of each and parcelled the rest. 

Sadly there was no Shahi Tukda as they weren't satisfied with the bread available locally and no Shirmaal as they couldn't get the correct food colour in Mumbai!

Radhe Singh washing Rhea's hands post meal.

We were so happy with the food and the parcels we took home that  were back the next week with our friend Jubal - who had heard so much from us about the amazing food that he drove down from Nahur when he heard we were on our way there.

We tried the Chicken Tangdi (drumstick) Kebabs, which were really lovely; the Kakori Kebabs, which were dry, gamey, pasty, over-spiced and a bit weird with the Afghani Naan or Afghani Parantha. The Afghani  which was an absolute delight was a kind of bread that I have never seen or eaten in Mumbai to date. The Afghani Parantha was sublime to say the least, sweet, slightly stretchy, crisp on the outside and spongy and soft on the inside with a divine taste. I would come back just to eat this!

With the Afghani we had the saalans we had missed out the last time - Jehangiri Chicken and Mutton Majlisi.
The combination was perhaps not the best idea as the Jehangiri was a subtle flavour with hints of kewra (screw pine essence) and mace whilst the Majlisi was a robust preparation cooked in mince and charged with pepper, black elaichi, cloves and cardamom ... cardamom appears to be the favourite spice at Naushijaan and is present in all its preparations.

We had to have the Degh ki Biryani (Of course!!) and I followed it with their Phirnee. The phirnee was rich, flavourful, not too sweet, full of nuts and a cardamom pod (!), but I was a bit peeved that it was served in a small 100ml plastic vaati against the usual shallow 'V' shaped earthenware dish.

All in all Naushijaan is an experience I recommend to all lovers of good food, meat and Awadhi/Lucknowi food in Mumbai ... its a great place for great food.


9th March 2013 ... 'tis with great sadness that I have to announce here that Naushijaan shut shop late last year ... I was told they felt they were very badly located and therefore wenren't doing as well as they needed to. :-(

Dum Pukht at the ITC Maratha

Rushina called me up in the last week of February asking me to join her in a Single Malt pairing with Indian Food. Alas, I was involved in archaeological field work in Mangaon Taluka and had to beg off. To make up for my disappointment she asked me to join her and a group of fellow bloggers at the ITC Maratha's newly refurbished and reopened Dum Pukht a couple of weeks later.

The cuisine of the Dum Pukht  is essentially Avadhi cuisine of the uppermost echelons. It is rich, redolent and delicious. The cuisine is predominantly non-vegetarian with Mutton being the mainstay. All the spice mixes always have one central spice that shines forth and can be easily singled out. Chicken, fish (mainly fresh water fish) and estuarine prawns are also major supporting artists in the ensemble. Dals of various sorts often cooked overnight, complex very rich desserts, sublime biryanis and a huge assortment of breads make up the cast. Vegetables are usually a part of the meat/fish dish with few solo exceptions like aubergines and okra. Their menus boast of a huge range of kebabs, salans (gravies) and other courses.

So with trusty camera in tow I zipped over to Sahar and met up with a whole host of blogger friends in the lobby of the ITC Maratha. Ever efficient Rini and Aishwarya had set up a beautiful table with some truly gorgeous handmade crockery by RAK Ceramics of the UAE. The new decor was way over the top and quite kitschy in a white and mirror way that made you feel opulent and Nawabi without being garish. Something I wouldn't do at home but wouldn't mind dining in.

As we were led to the table the bloggerazzi reached out and brought forth an impressive array of cameras .... Pranav Kacholia, Megha Goyal and Saee Koranne-Khandekar deserve special mention for their impressive cameras!

We were welcomed with traditional Awadhi greetings and as we were seated we were presented with personalised menus ... telling us that we were in for a truly sumptuous feast of near epic proportions. The china was breathtaking as was the glassware. The Dum Pukht's sommelier then informed us that he had chosen specific wines to compliment the various courses and proceeded to serve us with a lovely South African Chardonnay. When I told him I didn't much care to pair wines with Indian food he quickly got me a lovely dram of 16 yr old Lagavulin that went surprisingly well with the meal.

We started off with an array of starters. The first up was a simple chicken kebab with silver varakh (edible silver foil). This was followed by a lovely crumbed fried fillet of Bhetki (Barramundi) marinated in lemon, an influence from the Bengali past of the Awadhi dynasty. Next up was the Kakori Kebab, super soft, extremely finely minced, delicately spiced Sheeks. These were finger lickingly delicious! The next starter was a surprise. Dudiya Kabab - pan fried roundels of panir with a middle layer of spiced and mashed potatoes which were finished using a technique called Dum. This was truly an eye opener and a palette pleaser. After this were served up some very interesting vegetarian Sheeks made with lotus seed and stems and then large tikkis made with spinach and chickpeas.

The next course was a surprise. It was a shorba - an Indian soup, the soup plates were sprinkled with crisp sprouted moong (sans the seeds!!) upon which was poured a thick spicy vegetarian soup made of vegetable stock and moong dal. It was a true treat, both in texture and flavour, and a surprising winner.

The salans followed next. First up was a Jhinge ka Salan, Prawns in a yogurt gravy flavoured with fenugreek. It was an unmitigated disaster. They had used the wrong prawn, marine Tiger Prawns instead of estuarine or pond raised Bengali Golda Chingri; a salan that was neither here nor there; and lastly by overcooking the prawn till it was a block of rubber! A waste of good seafood.

As though to make up for this we were served with a lovely simple chicken cooked in a bowl with a pastry top like a pot-pie. Interestingly, as many of the bloggers pointed out, the coloured bell peppers and tomatoes in it were definitely not period.

Next up was a sublime, butter soft shank of lamb in a rich, thin gravy redolent of almonds, ghee and whole garam masalas. This dish - Shahi Nehari, was a traditional breakfast dish enjoyed by the Nawabs of Avadh. Sadly in this day and age instead of being cooked slowly in its spices over 8 hours .... the meat had been boiled separately and then mated with the gravy. The top note was one of cardamom. One wondered that if this tasted so delicious how much more astounding the slow cooked version mus have been. 

The gravy course was finished by a classic dal preparation Maash Qaliya. Suffice to say it was able to hold its own quite well amongst all the preceding stars.

All the salans were served with different flat-breads. Khamiri roti (a sourdough bread), Taftan Dum Pukht a flaky puff pastry kind, Tara Naan (a refined flour and semolina dough mixed with milk), Warqi paratha (a richer multi-layered ajwain flavoured bread), and their signature bread - the Naan-e-bah Khummach (semolina and whole wheat bread sprinkled with poppy seeds).

The next course, and one I had been waiting for, was the legendary Dum Pukht Biryani ... a dish where spiced and marinated mutton was cooked inside long grained and aromatic Basmati rice. It was an understated, divinely fragrant biryani. There were no frills and no unnecessary garnishes, it was amazingly aromatic with a gentle but firm waft of mace and kewra.  The mutton was silkily soft and the rice was fragrant yet light. It was a true classic. The Burhani Raita that accompaanied it was the perfect consort to a kingly dish.

After all this we realised the desserts were still to come! The sommelier paired them with a Hungarian dessert wine which I tasted but refused, it was too sweet for me. 


We were served the classic Kulfi which was quite nice, a Phirnee which was subtle and very classically understated and a enormous pistachio encrusted Gulab Jamun called the Shahed-e-Jam which was sadly too sweet and really not that great. 

We realised that the Dum Pukht team had overlooked the very famous dessert classic - the Shahi Tukda - a slice of leavened bread, pan fried in ghee, then dipped in sugar syrup flavored with kewra and topped with a hot layer of Rabdi (greatly reduced slightly sweetened milk) and assorted chopped nuts ... Rini and Aishwarya immediately complied with my request and we were served a very nice version of this classic. Though I must say that Jaffer Bhai's version is still the superior one!

All in all it was one of the best meals I have had this year, the company was great, the service superb, the hosting exquisite and the food really really good. Now if they only sort out the way they do their prawns and tighten up their desserts this will be the meal/restaurant to beat in Mumbai.

The Sated Bloggers!