Curry is constantly bubbling away in the background thoughts of this poster so I was tickled by this spicy story in Saturday’s Telegraph. The man in charge of catering on India’s railways has set himself the massive task of standardising the million meals served on his trains every day.
Rakesh Tandon’s problem is that a chicken curry made by a catering firm in Bengal may be completely different from one supplied by caterers in Kerala and his hungry customers don’t know whether their tastebuds are coming or going.
I can sympathise with his plight but can’t see him making much headway as he tries to tame regional tastes. Telling diners on a New Delhi train that they should eat a Mumbai style daal won’t make him many friends in either city.
Pinning down the food served in most Indian restaurants in Scotland to any one region is unlikely to come up with clear results but there are a few that specialise. In Glasgow, Dakhin and Dhabba serve dishes from south and north India respectively while Mezbaan in Edinburgh also takes it cue from southern India.