Aasif Mandvi Taste Tests High-End Indian Dishes | Curry Shop

slappy Pappy Wang Wang ji spicy should [ __ ] you with my head as I've explored Korean culture in New York City one common misconception is that it should be cheap fast and delivered in a Styrofoam container but there's a rich tradition of high-end Indian restaurants in New York City that challenged that expectation and deliver michelin-starred food worthy of a celebratory splurge today I'm hitting Junoon with someone who definitely deserves to celebrate aasif Mandvi is a hilarious comedian actor and daily show vet who's killing it with his one-man show sakinah's restaurant and we're gonna see what fancy curry is all about Thank You Asif for joining me on this lovely evening I think you're actually joining me okay I'm joining you yeah I was just here and then you just came and sat down with this whole crew it is what happened and now I've never been here and you've been here so I'm here all the time you were born in Mumbai and then you moved to the UK how do you see curry change within those cultures the UK has a very long history with India new colonialism and all that so when the British were in India they took our spices and they went back to England and they created this dish called chicken tikka masala and then they brought it back to India and then they convinced the Indians it was their food and I'm telling everyone right now is not our food and then in the u.s. it's a different take on curry I mean when I first got to America and that was like in the 80s nobody many people have never even tried in the info I think still today there are Americans that have never tried it in food I think it's still considered a kind of exotic other food you know so before we have our first meal yeah we're gonna toss it to the kitchen and see what we're about to eat my name is Akshay bhardwaj I'm the executive chef at Junoon restaurant which is an upscale modern Indian fine-dining restaurant we try to go with the modern twist on traditional dishes so that when a guest comes that they don't feel like they're necessarily an Indian restaurant they're at an upscale restaurant that serves Indian food for Jessa Lina and Asif I've prepared three dishes the ghost chili mark tikka of the Shahi lamb shank as well as the lobster muy Lee so for the ghost chili mark tikka but we prepared it by making a marination with hung yogurt ginger garlic paste fenugreek powder black salt and garam masala powder and then we finish it off with our ghost pepper paste it's not going to completely destroy a guest palate but it's still spicy enough where you appreciate the ghost pepper itself [Music] all right here we go now I'm a little nervous about the ghost pepper very afraid of no ghosts I'm afraid of a ghost pepper I here we go ready okay that's supervising whoo how do you like it just cuz I'm Indian holy like that's right his body right huh what some Yoga Yoga can we go to yogurt oh that [ __ ] hot bring that empty oh my god somebody just dropped us a mango lassi my ears are like sweating holy [ __ ] that is good but that counters the ghost pepper in a very delicious way I love what you gonna do spice but you have like this also about Indian food yeah so I don't do spice which is like a huge misconception on Indian people people think we can handle like chili pepper after chili pepper it's really different I think look it's like anybody else some people have a little higher tolerance for spicy somebody's a little low dollars I don't have a huge high tolerance for spice my father can eat like just Chili Peppers raw not always is spice correlated with like the burning playa knocking my throat background I got you you and it gets to the flavors how important is spice in Indian food that's that's what Indian cooking is chefs in India will just sort of Intuit what the spices are what the spices needs to be and assertively it's almost like jazz you know Indian cooking is like jazz yeah I know I reminds me when my mom was cooking and trying to teach me and then I was like no let me know the exact recipe legs no throwing stuff in and then I was like how much it's like however much you feel what you feel it's all about throwing a little bit of this Wilbert them and it's all an intuitive understanding of how these flavors all move together and weave together yeah it's like they're creating this tapestry of flavor boy town you know I love adding boy to the NJ boil happy Pappy went when G spicy should [ __ ] you with my head next up we have Janine Shahi lamb shank the lamb shank is made with black cumin yogurt curry and got'em masala and paired with potato salad let's do it so you just rip it you just go in just go right in smiles at some point Americans decided that foods like Indian or Mexican or considered cheap meats but they're willing to spend twenty thirty dollars on a bowl of pasta I mean you know I think that's changing and I think it has changed now a lot of the Indian food that people are exposed to it was much more kind of you know low-end cutting now you're seeing a lot more innovation and a lot more interesting flavors and a lot of these high-end places like Junoon are doing really interesting things like we saw with the Ghost Pepper dripping I think Indian food has now become a totally legitimate high-end food with real artistry and the kind of sense of a chef bringing their personality to it so we got one more dish coming yeah are you ready I am for the lobster Wow last but not least we have Janine's lobster Moily the dish is made with lobster coconut milk fenugreek tumeric and heirloom tomato I've never had Lobster in an Indian restaurant before it's good mm-hmm very coconutty mm-hmm I feel like lobster in a high-end restaurant is a very common piece that shows you it indicates that we out here ballin more than any one particular sort of like dish I think it's more the innovation the presentation different flavors the different influences the cross-pollination I think that's where the status symbol sort of is around Indian food not so much in life whether it's lobster or duck or in an amine I feel like I've had a prawn curry so for me this isn't like so it's similar to that right but I think you are right like the more creative they can get the more high-end it seems right because they're throwing it together in an unusual way that actually works so you have a one-man show coming out in October it's actually a return sakinah's restaurant yeah and it focuses on the immigrant coming here and finding a place in the culinary world why is food a powerful connection to cultural identity as a person who wanted to tell stories about immigrants who wanted to tell stories about identity food became a great access point it became an entry point into that world and into that culture we said it in a restaurant and we use food as a metaphor for integration do you integrate two aspects of yourself together that's what food can do you know you you take a spice from here you take a flavor from there you put it together you create something new and that's what you and I actually are you're Canadian but you're many things right I'm American Indian like British and so we're kind of this masala and that is the metaphor of Indian food and and that is the metaphor into the sort of muddled up identity that you know we are we carry around with us well thank you very much for joining me on this journey through spice and thank you very much for inviting me and for paying for dinner you're paying for dinner York no I think your paper time you got the check I got a place to be I don't think I have the chair I'm what what I think good yeah I believe somebody needs to call my agent because that was not part of the deal [Music]

Channel: First We Feast

Views: 245,408

Rating: 4.7555404 out of 5

Keywords: First we feast, fwf, firstwefeast, food, food porn, cook, cooking, chef, kitchen, recipe, cocktail, bartender, craft beer, complex, complex media, Cook (Profession)sean evans, curry shop, the curry shop, the curry show, horsepowar, horsepower, horsepower rapper, horsepowar rapper, horsepowar curry shop, jasleen powar, junoon, aasif mandvi, indian curry, tikka masala, aasif mandvi curry shop

Id: 79f3T71LuXg

Length: 9min 21sec (561 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 15 2018