Taj was the first to start a buffet lunch. It cost Rs. 5 or Rs. 7, I forget the exact amount, but the idea of serving yourself and eating as much as you liked was quite interesting. Go hungry, I used to be advised, then eat as much as you can, paisa vasool.

Of course, I never did go to the Taj buffet, Rs. 5 and Rs. 7 out of a monthly pocket allowance of Rs. 10 was a lot of money. However, at small vegetarian restaurants in the Fort, the practice of eating as much as you

liked of thali meals was already there. Chhaya, Santosh and B. Tambe, at a price of 75 paise (12 annas), served unlimited thalis, or at least, some of the items were unlimited. But, of course the waiter served you, it was not buffet.

Buffet, as I said, I found quite intriguing. All Bombay did. When the Outrigger opened at the Oberoi, which was many, many years later, it began a buffet lunch for Rs. 100. A hundred rupees was a lot of money for some people, but not for everybody, and crowds and crowds went to the Outrigger. I must say they had an excellent spread, everything that was cooked in all the different restaurants of the hotel the previous day and left over. The cheese alone were worth more than Rs. 100, and if you were clever enough and pig enough to make a meal exclusively out of the cheese tray, you would come out plus.

All this fascination with buffet food is in the past. Of late, every dinner I am invited to, whether in a restaurant or somebody's house, is a buffet. And it is a bore. I mean, the very idea or standing in a queue, plate and napkin in hand, like waiters at the hot plate in the kitchen, waiting for my turn, while the lady in front of me carefully separates the peas from the rice before serving herself, then with my myopia bending down and reading the little notices under the dishes to find out which is mutton rogan josh and which is chicken dahiwalla, then spooning the food into my plate without dropping it or burning myself, is a chore.

Buffet also means that there are no tables and less chairs than the number of guests. So I have to find a quiet corner without too many elbows, balance the plate in one hand, fork in the other, forget the knife, wonder if I made a mistake in getting the dal in a separate bowl, for which there is no place in the plate.

Just then the waiter, or family retainer, comes along, inquiring if I would like to have red or white wine. I normally, and regretfully, say neither, since I do not know where to place the glass, short of in the middle of the mutton gravy in the plate.

So, these days, I make an effort to find out whether the meal is going to be buffet or sit down. If it is buffet, I eat at home, and go only for the drinks and the ice-cream. Though even the ice-cream, balancing the glass on a little saucer, and, with a tiny spoon, which, every time I dig into the ice-cream makes the glass slip, is a bit of a problem.

- Busybee

This piece first appeared in the Afternoon Despatch and Courier of Oct 9, 1995.

These last few days, I have been doing a lot of fusion eating. Punjabi Paneer Fry with Russian Caviar, Gujarati Dhoklas with French Pate de Foie Gras, Egg Bhurjis with a scattering of Mediterranean olives inside, etc. I have pretended to like all this, since I do not want to upset the chefs, but I really don't. I like to have one taste in my mouth at a time, and preferably for an entire meal, and not a medley of tastes which confuse the palate and the mind. Indigo, otherwise Rahul Akerkar's outstanding restaurant on Mandlik Road, makes a mousse out of an alphonso mango, then stuffs it into the belly of a pomfret and serves it, the chef telling you all the time that it is a simple dish. I like mangoes as a dessert, especially if somebody goes to the trouble of peeling, cutting and making a mousse out of the mango for me. And I like the pomfret as the fish course. But combining the two and making an entree out of them, I don't appreciate.

Sidewok at the NCPA, which replaces the dreary Rangoli with its afternoon buffets, has several fusion dishes created by the redoubtable Chef Hemant Oberoi. He has got salmon from Norway, flown here direct from the ice-capped seas. He applies tandoori masala on it and grills it in a tandoor. India meets Norway. I have eaten it, compliments of the chef, and I must say it is an excellent dish, Norwegian Salmon which tastes like Tandoori Chicken.

People say there is no adventure in my eating, my food habits are too straight-forward and prosaic. Perhaps. It is not that I do not like the food of different countries, I do, some more than the other. It is rather that I prefer to eat one nation's food at a time, not several nations, combined. I like garam masalas in Indian food and lemon grass in Thai food, and not vice versa. And I want to eat chapatis with dal, not Chinese pao.

Most restaurants today claim that their food is not authentic Chinese or Thai or Lebanese or Mexican. It is adapted to meet the approval of Indian palates. Which is fine, and I am sure hoteliers know their business, but how could the Indian palate be tutored if it is given curry leaves and kothmir in all its Szechwan foods, or hot gulab jamuns with vanilla ice-creams. Though, come to think of it, the last does not sound all that bad.

There is another and an older experiment which also I do not much care for. This is the mixing of meats like making a vegetable stew. Hence, you get a chicken breast filled with minced prawn. I would rather have the chicken first, then the prawns. Or, better still, the prawns first, then the chicken.

- Busybee

This piece first appeared in the Afternoon Despatch and Courier of February 1, 2000.

Few pleasures in life match drinking in the afternoon. Only if you can afford it, should you indulge in it.

It is not for the busy executive, who is making deals over his executive lunch, and it is not for the poor clerk, who has to keep an eye on the clock and rush back to work. You need a lot of time, and a job that does not require your attention after lunch.

You can drink in a five-star bar, there is nothing wrong with that, the Apollo rather than the Harbour, with the afternoon streaming in from the windows. Or the Lancer's, with the Nariman Point palms bending in the breeze outside the window. But a hotel is meant more for the evenings, a Club is preferable in the afternoons.

The Willingdon and CCI bars are ideally suited for the afternoons, their wide picture windows look out on a well-kept golf course and a well-kept cricket ground, respectively. I do not know if you have walked into one of these bars on an afternoon, particularly the CCI's, which is placed at a lower trajectory. The ground sort of continues from the bar, and there is the quiet of an empty stadium. I have only recently realised that there is nothing more peaceful than an empty stadium, especially if on some other occasion you have seen it packed and noisy.

Beer is the preferred drink of the afternoon, though, if you have to return to work, pink gins and bloody marys may be wiser choices.

Lunch also depends on how you are managing the rest of the working day. If there is going to be a 40-minute siesta in the lounge, preferably on a Parsi (Goan) easy-chair, legs spread out like a woman delivering, a Madras curry or a Parsi dhanshak would be ideal, especially if you are at the Yacht Club, where the condiments include bits of Bombay Duck, dried and roasted, and a green chutney that is fresh and wet.

But if you have to go back to work (never say, rush back to work), dine on the Chinese. Steamed dumplings, steamed noodles, a little Chinese cabbage on the side, dipped in soy. There are those who recommend salads. Must be ideal for lunch, but I cannot appreciate them, you chew and you chew and you chew and you end up eating leaves.

More than the food and the drinks, it is the ambience of drinking, dining and gossiping in a bar on a working day in the middle of a working week. There is some arrogance in this, not being among the workers of the world for 90 minutes. To sit back and relax, and not think of the work piling up on the desk, drinking perhaps a vodka, with orange, at the Grand Hotel, Ballard Pier. That would take me back a quarter century.

- Busybee

This piece first appeared in the Afternoon Despatch and Courier of May 20, 1998.

When we talk about the eating habits of the Parsis, we talk about their wedding dinners, what is referred to as the lagan nu bhonu. I am equally fascinated by their breakfasts. And since I am writing this at breakfast time, though without a Parsi breakfast, I will concentrate on that subject.

On auspicious days, they make sweet vermicelli, known as sev. You can buy it in the market, Hathi Chaap brand. They fry it in ghee, with a lot of sugar, and with almonds peeled and sliced lengthwise, raisins, and charoli. And on the sev are placed hard-boiled eggs.

Some families, instead of sev, make rava. And rava is rava. What South Indian restaurants call Upma, and even Sheera, if it were sweet. But the Parsi rava, served on auspicious occasions, is absolutely white, with the usual almonds and raisins on top, and fresh petals of pink roses.

Why some families prepare sev and others rava, I don not know. It may be the same reason why some families go to one of the two main fire-temple at Dhobi Talao and others to the second one - a question of family custom. The matter should be of interest exclusively to the Parsis.

What is of interest to us non-Parsis is that not only do they prepare this auspicious breakfast and consume it, but also send it to all their neighbours and friends in silver trays. The silver trays are to be returned, of course. This is not an Ambani or Singhania wedding where you keep the silver tray along with the invitation.

Also sent are bananas, yellow, and nicely sliced, and a bowl of curds, sweet and with rose petals.

That, I think, more or less, completes the auspicious occasion breakfast. The regular Parsi breakfast is a little more elaborate.

There are always eggs. A Parsi poro, which is flat omelette, with tomatoes, green chillies, onions, kothmir, the works, slightly burnt underside, sizzling and frothing on top. Or an akuri, which is Parsi specialty, scrambled eggs with all the above-mentioned ingredients, kept purposely wet.

The Taj hotels, being Parsi, serve akuri for breakfast, but they over cook it and serve it on toast and generally ruin it. I think, they are better at lemon grass than akuri.

However, the best Parsi breakfasts I had have been in modest Parsi-owned hotels outside Bombay. At Il Palazzo and Dina in Panchgani-Mahabaleshwar, and Oliaji's in Devka. Here, besides the eggs and the porridge and Mala's jam and the rest, they serve a meat dish - a wet Parsi kheema with new potatoes, or kidney, liver or best of all, a gently cooked brain, made in its own juices, with chopped tomatoes and kothmir. At Oliaji's on the beach, there is an addition: fresh Bombay Ducks and sweet morning toddy.

And, if all this makes you hungry, you may make up with a good lunch, or, depending on when you are reading this, a good dinner catered by Bomi Patel.

Jamva chalo ji.

- Busybee

This piece first appeared in the Afternoon Despatch and Courier of Feb 10, 2001.

In boarding school, everything was organised and orderly, including food. For instance, for breakfast, on alternate days we used to have two slices of bread, buttered and unbuttered. Buttered on one day, unbuttered the next day. On days that the bread was not buttered, there was a side dish, either a piece of an omelette, or one fried egg, or a cutlet made with methi, which the boys used to call muthia, or mashed potatoes, which the boys called with a less polite name. Also, for breakfast, there was one saucer of porridge and a banana.

There was continuous trading in food among the boys, and the rates were more or less standard. A boy could trade an unbuttered slice of bread for a banana, or the rim of a buttered slice for the same banana. For a porridge, there were two bananas, or one slice of buttered bread, or rims of two slices of buttered bread. For the side-dishes, the prices varied, on his lucky day a boy could get a slice of buttered bread and two porridges for an omelette.

Accounts were kept and some boys had ten porridges and seven buttered slices in their credit. It was up to the claimant on which day he wanted his trade off, he could either have it immediately or add to the total and keep it waiting.

There was another feature also. Supposing boy no. 2 owed a porridge to boy no. 1. And boy no. 3 owed a porridge to boy no. 2. Then boy no. 2 could tell boy no. 3 to give his porridge to boy no. 1.

At lunch, there was no business, boys could not trade dal and rice as there was no limit to the quantity served. Those who had traded off their entire breakfast in the morning, used to tuck in great quantities of rice and dal at lunch.

On Sundays, it was ice-cream, the 'Made in Sancha' ice-cream, which was the only type of ice-cream then available. And if a boy had the heart and determination to trade his ice-cream, he could get lots of things in return during the next few days. So, from boy to boy, sitting in rows at long dining tables, the message would be transmitted.

'Pesi Sodawaterwalla wants to trade his ice-cream. What is he offered?'

I understand Pesi Sodawaterwalla has grown up to be a highly successful businessman.

- Busybee

This piece first appeared in the Afternoon Despatch and Courier of November 17, 1998.

If you ask me nationality-wise, the food I like best is Japanese. I know they present their food extremely well, like still-life paintings, but it is also excellent to eat. Half the food is raw, meats and fish, to be dipped in a sauce and eaten. The sauce is normally soya, in which the diner puts a dollop of flaming hot horse radish, and mixes it with his chopsticks.

The chopsticks are flatter than the Chinese ones, and therefore easier to eat with, though on this I have to do more research. They are also rough-grained pieces of wood, to be disposed at the end of the meal, unlike the Chinese, which are often ivory, and kept as family heirlooms. Also, quite often, the Japanese chopsticks are stuck together in pairs. The diner tears them apart and eats. Knives and forks are rarely available, and if you ask them, they would have to put up a search to find them. When in Rome, be like the Romans, and when in Kyoto, eat like the Kyoteans. Best, if you can't handle the chopsticks, eat with your hands.

The most delectable of Japanese food, also the best known, is sushi. This is raw fish, particularly the red tuna, which the Japanese die for, and raw meats. Since they are raw, naturally they have to be very fresh and very tender. Which they are. The meats are put on the top of little rice balls, the rice grains packed together tightly like small cylinders. And so that they do not spill open, a sea weed is wrapped around them, like a bandage or a retaining strap. You have to eat the sea weed also, not unwrap it and put it aside. The rice balls make it all the more difficult to pick up a sushi with chopsticks, but you can delicately pick it up with thumb and index finger and pop it in the mouth, after dipping in the sauce. The horse radish is the main event, do not forget it. And go easy on it, it can travel from the mouth, through the nose, and hit the head.

There are sushi bars all over Japan. The young men manning them are like expert bartenders, they work with a flourish. They all wear Samurai head-bands and a ear-ring.

You may buy sushi on the road also, carry it to the office and eat during lunchtime. There are an assortment of sushis in a compartmentalised wooden box, complete with chopsticks, sauces, very neat. If it is an expensive sushi, there is a lacquered box. You can also buy these sushi boxes in the Bullet Trains. I understand that at London's Piccadily station, they have opened a sushi stall and are selling take-away boxes. Mr. N.J. Nanporia, a great sushi fan, told me this.

I shall check it out the next time I am in London. But I would rather go to Tokyo than London.

- Busybee

This piece first appeared in the Afternoon Despatch and Courier of June 23, 1999.

My liquor level now is four large pegs, occasionally extending to five, if the liquor is good, and, more important, the company. By company I mean people who drink as much as I do. I hate drinking with people who consume a quarter of what I do and watch me the rest of the evening drinking and misbehaving. But beyond five I seldom go these days, because next morning it is hell, with the carpenters occupying the inside of my head and banging away.

However, I am embarrassed to tell people I do not go beyond four ... I have a reputation to keep.

I used to drink two bottles of the crudest of country liquors, with two packets of Charminars, at one stage, then walk home straight on the road divider. My friend and senior collegue in every way, the late U.G. Rao, went one better. He insisted that a man should go home by a BEST bus after a serious session of drinking, to prove to himself that he could manage.

Drinking, like any other activity in a man's life, is like a graph, rising at the start, reaching an ultimate height, then tapering down. I had begun with half a peg, a nav taank in the local language, then steadily increased my consumption. There was a stage when it looked like there was no limit. The drinking was measured in time, from 9 o'clock in the evening to 3 o'clock the following morning.

And I could drink most people under the table. Though under the bed would be more appropriate, because we used to drink in speakeasies, in auntie's' homes and their bedrooms. It was many years before I experienced the pleasures of drinking in a proper bar.

When I started going to the bars, I patronised the Harbour Bar at the Taj and the Society at the Ambassador. That was me. Straight to the top, nothing in between. And rum, Rosa Rum, 12 years old, because that was all I could afford, Scotch was beyond me. Still, for a man who had been drinking `country' all his preceding life, rum was living it up.

To return to the graph, mentioned earlier. A drinker begins with small pegs, before he knows it, the pegs have increased to a bottle. A bottle of rum between two friends. Finish it, then go out in the middle of the night searching for more liquor. Then the drinker reaches the age where he begins to slow down, two bottles become one, and one becomes half, after that the counting is in pegs.

Take more soda with your drink, take more water, no, no ice, please. Eat before you drink, to line your stomach, and eat while drinking, olives preferably, and chicken tikka (why not!), and don't skip your dinner, always eat after you drink, and don't drink after eating. So many rules to follow as the graph runs down the slope and nears the rock bottom.

So you ask me where my graph has reached? I wish I knew.

- Busybee

This piece first appeared in the Afternoon Despatch and Courier of August 25, 2000.