A tale of two tables: When Britain and India sit down to eat | Bengaluru News

A spoonful of curry, a slice of cheddar or a steaming cup of chai — food has long been one of the most delicious ways Britain and India have influenced each other. A recent gathering led by the UK Government’s Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade (BIST) brought British ingredients and food traditions into conversation with Indian kitchens. Beneath the tasting plates and marinades was a bigger conversation — not about what Britain brought to India or India gave Britain, but about how food travels, evolves and acquires new meanings along the way.British vs India: Who influenced whom?The familiar story of British-Indian food can sound like a one-way exchange: the British arrived, and Indian ingredients and dishes entered British life. Owen Richards, Deputy Head of Mission at the British Deputy High Commission in Bengaluru, sees it differently. “I think you brought a lot of spices and interest to our food,” he says. “We needed it.” He adds that “chicken tikka masala sits comfortably in the British culinary imagination alongside fish and chips.”He recalls that as a boy, Indian food in Britain was simply “curry”. Today, he knows the difference between cardamom, cinnamon and star anise — and how the order in which spices hit the pan can change a dish. India itself, he says, is comparable to “Western Europe. It’s got that size and variety and even more languages, more cuisines.” And the more he learns, the more aware he is of what he doesn’t know. “The more you know, the more you realise you need to know more. We’re just beginning, really, our understanding of the complexity of Indian food.”

A boy, a cookbook and the aroma of his father’s kitchenOwen Richards has a simple confession: “I love cooking.” He traces his love of cooking not to Britain, but to necessity abroad. His first posting was in Mumbai in the early ‘90s, where he ate out constantly because the food was “wonderful”. When he moved to Geneva, he tried to maintain the habit and nearly went broke. “I realised I was eating my entire salary. So I got a cookbook by Nigel Slater. It has a thirty-minute recipe collection, right from vegetarian meals to meats, fish and desserts,” he recalls.That accidental culinary education turned a diplomat into a home cook. But ask him about the aroma that transports him straight back to Britain, and the answer isn’t a grand banquet. It’s his father’s kitchen. He says, “My father was a great cook and he used to spend hours making meat pies so it would be soft and flavoursome. But he also had a sweet tooth. I remember watching him boiling sugar with various essences of mint. So if I smell that, I’m immediately transported back to our kitchen.”As for the Indian dish he has loved the longest, it dates back to that first Mumbai posting: pav bhaji. These days, living in the South, he has developed an appreciation for the subtlety of local staples. “There’s a lot of subtlety in dosa and idli, and it’s a very nice way to start the day,” he states.Two dishes, two directionsFor the masterclass, Chef Samson Nitish Roy chose two British classics: Welsh Rarebit and Sticky Toffee Pudding. The rarebit, he explains, comes with a joke baked into its name — a vegetarian dish created to mimic the soft texture of rabbit meat using cheese, hence “false rabbit”. The sticky toffee pudding, meanwhile, gets its richness from dates blended into a paste rather than relying entirely on refined sugar. It is finished with warm toffee syrup and cold ice cream — “hot and cold... it melts fast,” Roy says.His favourite fusion idea? “Take a British-style grill marinade and use it on chicken before making biryani. The rice remains recognisably Indian, but the marinade introduces another layer of flavour,” he explains.Asked what Britain could borrow from India, Roy suggests adapting chole bhature for British diners, perhaps “using bread in a different format and dialing down the spice”. Indian sweets such as gulab jamun and rosogolla, he adds, could also be reimagined alongside British desserts and chilled sweet dishes.His own comfort food, tellingly, isn’t Indian at all. It’s sticky toffee pudding — easy to make and rooted in a childhood spent baking.

Bengaluru’s appetite for British food“Bengaluru is very cosmopolitan. Here, people arrive from across India and across the world, and they carry an experimental mindset from the office straight into their evenings,” Owen says. “People say, ‘I want to try new things’,” he adds, describing the city’s appetite, “and that’s why British ingredients are going to be popular here.”It’s also, he notes with a laugh, why he still imports his tea from home — strong English breakfast tea, brewed hot enough to drink immediately without stewing. Bringing tea to India, he jokes, is his own version of “coals to Newcastle”. He hasn’t finished exploring Karnataka either. Hampi and a plate of Mangalorean fish curry are still on his list, alongside a nostalgic fondness for chai served in a cracked cup by the roadside.British ingredients to know