You are what you eat

Stationed in another country, away from home, I am  better able to appreciate the horror that Sam and Fran must have felt during one conversation we had sometime last year in a bar on Marylebone High Street. I am not quite sure how it arose, but it began with my confession that it would be unlikely that I would be a regular of any sort to Mooli's. In fact I said I don't think I would go there that often. This was not because I did not believe in the concept, indeed my statement was based on the assumption that Mooli's would be making the tastiest indian wraps/roll around. 

It was more, as I explained to Sam (who was still in horror, as if I had eloped with his favourite chess piece, Tanusri, to a poker tournament in Las Vegas), the fact that I had Indian food fatigue, due to habits at home. My stellar mother would cook wonderful indian dishes but, unfortunately for Sam and Mooli's, also, what I like to call, intellectual indianised world cuisine ( "IIWC" ).  IIWC involved cleverly inserting or indianising every dish from around the world so that fruit salads would be spicy, coriander would suddenly feature in Italian cooking, slowly replacing basil completely, burgers would evolve into kebabs or at least be spicier than anything McDonalds ever envisaged...we could go on. And so it was against this background that away from home at work the last thing I wanted to do was to eat Indian food. In fact I craved something pure and non-indian, so non-indian that if I was ever served by a S Asian looking person I was scared that they may surreptitiously add some spice or coriander to my food. 

But I am happy to report that I am enjoying a happier balance, and now find myself in this lovely foreign country sometimes even craving for a good dosa or lamb curry. So the IIWC complex has gone. And I would love a Mooli's here. 

But the strange thing is that Mooli's has itself undergone a change from what was envisaged during that night on Marylebone high street. It is no longer about doing classic dishes well, such as tandoori chicken or other types of kebabs. Although the boards will say "divine street cuisine", the food inside will be nothing like the street cuisine one imagines from S Asia. The innovation and originality of the dishes and their surroundings mean that Mooli's will be serving up something quite unique, it will be Sam's and Mathew's version of street cuisine. And faced with such inventive choices even those badly afflicted with IIWC will want to take a peek, at least once a week.