Galouticious Glutton

Our visit to Lucknow came up with surprises. No wonder that Satyajit Ray had fixed this city as the location for his first Feluda novel "Baadshai Aangti". We are all too blind to follow his taste.

For the first time I was in a city where there was not a single advertisement on engianeering or medical science to be pursued as a professional career. Aspirents out there are also least bothered about doing their Business Administration degrees. The top-brass government jobs matter to the city with stand alone empasis on Law as a career because everywhere in the city all one can find are the posters and and banners and signs that impeded the cleanlines of the walls and the visibily of the open sky promoting working for in high posts, stature and honour under the State and the Nation to serve the nation.

Time & Steps 

My queer curiosity drove me to delve a little deeper into things trending there and it was found that at the Higher Secondary level schools in the city do have a crisis of seats in the Humanities section while most of the seats in the Science section are left empty. No one is much interested in Sciences. With a proper heritage to its old culture and tradition the city still outstands the entire India and its average craze.

In Uttar Pradesh losing an academic year of a child does not matter. There are instances that foresighted parents put their children in class 1 as late as when they are seven year old. Their brains are, by that time, more mature and they work faster than their classmates. This gets them to get a better grip over studies than others in the same class. At the end, every year India gets the finest and the most IASs and IPSs from the soil of the UP. They still have the royal outlook in the independent India to be positioned and work for.

The Great Emperor's predecessors lost to the British. Does that matter? He still remained in the throne. So many stories on him to tell because he was equally inclined to the aesthetic edges, be it a battle, music or art with special emphasis on the culinary genre. He believed that the mind works its best and a confidante is best acheived from someone when ones stomach is full and hunger is satiated to ones satisfaction. It really worked. The Khansamas(cooks) of his kitchen gave their best because no one else before had given them so much of importance which equals to the administrative levels of the highest kind and quality.

He was a great connoisseur of art and culture. His Nawabai Chaal (the aura of the royal presence) was different from many others. In his era classical music found a different upsurge. During his regime only, the royal kitchen was turned into a laboratory of culinary art where every single day the cooks had to deliver a new invention with any single dish to serve the penchant of the Nawab.

Galauti Kebab @ Tunde Kebabi, Lucknow PC: Rhito 

Nawab turned older and time took away his dentures gradually. He was left with almost no tooth. The loyal khansama chief found a way out. He devised a recipe with finely chopped softest lamb portions and almost one hundred and fifty spices to be known as Galauti/Golowti (meaning 'to melt in the mouth') Kebab.

The heir to Siraj-ud-Daula, Nawab Asad-ud-Daula's aging was the reason that the royal cook's taste invented two reacord breaking dishes ever, namely Moti Pulao and Tundey Kebab. The chief royal chef Mohhemed Haji Fakr-e-Alam Sahab came up with another wonder--Galauti Kebab. The combo of the royal penchant and the competent hands to satiate it, brought about a Renaissance in the art of cooking through the invention of this dish.

It is a debate still that the invention of Galauti kebab took place during the regime of Asad-ud-Daula or Nawab Wajid Ali Shah, the eleventh and last Nawbab of Awadh holding his position for nine years from 1847 to 1856. The entire Nawbabi aura goes well with Wajid Ali Shah with his sixty-five years of life span.

Nawbab Wajid Ali Shah 

There are handful of restaurants around the nation those dare venture with galauti kebab. In lucknow Galouti is in galore. However, my suggestions are Tunde Kebabi Restaurant and, to go notches higher, Dastarkhwan.

India Restaurant, Khidirpore, Kolkata

In Kolkata, Galauti kebab is a rare breed. Just beside Khiddirpur Fancy Market, India Restaurant serves galauti kebab regularly with a fair price and quality and quantity. And believe me, it is worth trying....