MAKE EVERY BITE SUSTAINABLE

FEW YEARS AGO, phrases like ‘farm-to-fork’ and ‘nose-to-tail’ quietly entered the Indian culinary lexicon, picked their spots, and put down their roots. Sustainable gastronomy quickly became à la mode; the culinary glitterati picked up on the trend with haste and restaurants soon followed suit, sprinkling every course with a feel-good greenness. What was then a thin yet persistent buzz in the room has now blown up into a movement, ever since COVID-19 hit the industry.

AIndia may be the second largest food producer in the world, but it ranks 33rd among the 67 countries on the

Food Sustainability Index 2018. The fact that urbanisation has been pushing farms further away from towns doesn’t help either. Then there’s the obsession with imported ingredients that not only increases the food’s carbon footprint, but also forces Indian farmers to grow ‘exotic’ variants by overusing chemicals and pesticides. However, all is not lost yet.

A new league of farmers, chefs, and industry leaders are working on bringing local, seasonal, and organic ingredients back into the game, while some others have been advocating sustainable sourcing long before ‘go local’ became a trend. Multiple award-winning chef Sabyasachi Gorai (aka Chef Saby), for instance, comes from a family of farmers, and has been conscious of the benefits of sustainable sourcing for over 20 years now. “We have farms in Sunderbans and Dimapur, and I go back to West Bengal every year during the harvest season to handpick produce. It’s regional, it’s healthy, and it saves cost,” he explains.

Along with chefs Megha Kohli and

Anahita Dhondy, Chef Saby is a part of Chefs’ Manifesto, an online community by SDG2 (Sustainable Development Goal 2) Advocacy Hub (sdg2advocacyhub.org). This community has over 30 chefs from 38 countries who work in different ways towards the same goals: end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture by 2030.

The menus at Chef Radhika Khandelwal’s

Delhi restaurants, Fig & Maple and Ivy & Bean, are always a bunch of loose sheets—they highlight hyper-seasonal ingredients, and the dishes are constantly changing. “We are an ingredient-focussed space, which means that we do everything in our power to source and use local, seasonal, and lesser-known indigenous ingredients. For us, it is not enough that we only use what is in season but also equally important to know where it is coming from,” says Khandelwal, who works directly with farmers, small scale producers, and specialist growers.

Meanwhile, a revolution is brewing in home kitchens too. Health-conscious millennials living in metropolitan cities are turning to local farmer markets

Everything used in Andaz Delhi’s AnnaMaya restaurant is made in India and sourced from artisan partners.

Green Theory is based in a restored colonial bungalow surrounded by 800-plus plants. Left: The menu at the cloud kitchen Iktara revolves around seasonal produce.