Cyrus Todiwala: A Life Through Food

The Food Programme

BBC

Arts, Food

4.4 • 943 Ratings

🗓️ 28 June 2021

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

From Mumbai childhood to pioneering London chef, Mr Todiwala's Life Through Food; a story involving the legendary dish Bombay Duck and an important connection with Freddie Mercury.

After years spent cooking in India, first at the prestigious Taj Mahal hotel and then in Goa, Cyrus Todiwala moved to London with his wife Pervin and created one of the most influential south Asian restaurants in the UK, Café Spice Namaste.

With an emphasis on authentic regional classics including lamb dhaansaak and Goan prawn curry, for twenty five years Café Spice helped reshape Britain's understanding of Indian food. Cyrus and Pervin tell the story of how it all happened, why they were forced to close the original restaurant in 2020 and how it's being reborn and reinvented in another part of east London.

An important driving force in Cyrus's life (and his cooking) is his faith (Zoroastrianism) and his identity (as a member of India's Parsee community). He explains how they have both shaped his outlook on life and his work as a chef.

Produced and presented for BBC Audio in Bristol by Dan Saladino.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're about to listen to a BBC podcast and I'd like to tell you a bit about the
0:03.8	podcast I work on. I'm Dan Clark and I commissioned factual podcasts at the BBC.
0:08.6	It's a massive area but I'd sum it up as stories to help us make sense of the forces shaping the world.
0:15.3	What podcasting does is give us the space and the time to take brilliant BBC journalism
0:19.8	and tell amazing compelling stories that really get behind the headlines.
0:23.7	And what I get really excited about is when we find a way of drawing you into a subject
0:28.4	you might not even have thought you were interested in.
0:30.2	Whether it's investigations, science, tech, politics, culture, true crime, the environment,
0:36.1	you can always discover more with a podcast on BBC Sounds.
0:40.0	Hello, you've downloaded a podcast of BBC Radio Falls The Food Programme.
0:44.6	I'm Dan Saladino. Welcome to our world.
0:48.0	From cooking to culture, politics to pleasure.
0:51.2	We hope you enjoy this edition.
0:53.4	This story begins with a train journey across India, one that will take us from
1:04.4	Kolkata in the east to Mumbai in the west, a 1200 mile adventure that can take
1:10.4	three days to complete.
1:17.8	Our interest in this train journey is its role in one of the most enigmatic food stories ever told.
1:22.3	The origins of the dish, Bombay Duck, which as you might already know doesn't
1:28.0	involve a species that takes to the air, but instead one that lives in the ocean.
1:35.0	So it's a fish, it stinks like hell, when it's dry, when it's fresh is beautiful.
1:43.8	But only the people of Bombay know how to eat a Bombay duck
1:46.3	when it's fresh.
	...

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