It could have been a scene straight out of an Enid Blyton book. Breakfast under leafy boughs, with little squirrels scampering across the  green grass and dancing peacocks for  company. The food? Delectable. Prepared by my charming hostess Anamika Lalbhai, a picture of understated elegance. 

I made my way to her house - 'Shalimar', a little after 8 a.m.,  swinging into the large gates of her home. The house is at Shahibaug, quite close to the main part of the city; a fifteen minute  drive got me there.

On entering the driveway, the main house stands majestically on the left. Ahead is a sprawling garden and beyond that a house that peeps through the foliage. This was where Anamika was waiting  for me and as I happily crossed the green expanse to meet her, I suddenly stopped short to see beautiful peacocks    dancing in all their glory as if to welcome me! In a jiffy I trained my cameras on them and captured  for posterity a most awesome sight. As I  focussed on them, they obligingly did an impromptu dance and preened like prima donnas for me. A breath taking sight indeed. I clicked away happily  only to discover more of them in the adjacent garden. Wow!

Peacocks I believe, are extremely shy birds, known to baulk and flutter away at the slightest provocation. But these were different  and definitely not camera-shy. Through the garden a paved path led upto the house. It is a single-storey place, a section of the Lalbhai home meant for entertaining guests. Anamika was seated inside, dressed in a  cool salwar khameez and she waved me in with a cheerful good-morning. I had to tell her about the lovely creatures I encountered in her beautiful garden.  "Oh, you know I tend to that myself," she replies. No mean task, for the garden is a whole five acres! "The grass is the toughest to maintain, but it's my favourite part of the greenery, so I work with my maalis to ensure that it looks nice." At her behest we take a stroll  around it. Anamika shows me her prized heliconias and adenium bonsai.

We then came back to the place  where we started to have a chat. The house is in keeping with true Gujarati tradition. It has lovely ornate wood carving  but not too cluttered. The walls have some lovely works of art. That would stem from her husband Samveg's fondess for it. He is an art collector for some years now, says his wife. Perhaps the desire for all things opulent runs in the family, after all it is a well-known fact that the family history can be traced back to sixteen generations! Samveg's 13th ancestor Sheth Shantidas was the chief jeweller at the court of Emperor Akbar. He was appointed 'Nagarsheth' of Ahmedabad. It is said, that the family had a close relationship with the Mughal Emperors of India. This title remained with each head of the family in succession, until Indian independence. The Lalbhai's are known as the 'mill pioneers' of Ahmedabad. In 1931, Kasturbhai Lalbhai, Samveg's grand uncle founded the Arvind Mills that manufactured fine and superfine varieties of cloth quite different from the coarse variety of cloth produced then. By 1939, his business empire was rated the seventh largest cotton manufacturer.   He was the director of the Reserve Bank of India from 1937 to 1949 and was one of the founders of the Ahmedabad Education Society.

Anamika's was an arranged marriage. She came into the family twenty-five years ago, from the famous textile family of S Kumars; a niece of businessman Sushil Kumar. For a Hindu girl marrying into a Jain family, her adjustment into the home must not have been too easy, I remarked. "Well, it was tough. Let's just say I have much more confidence today than I did so long ago," she admits with a smile. Samveg and Anamika's 17-year old son Saumya had just left for Singapore two days ago,  to pursue an IB degree. Their daughter Snehal is a Creative Copy Writer with Ogilvy and Mather in Bombay.

Meanwhile as we chat, the servants lay out the breakfast outside. It is rustic; a thick tree trunk to serve as the main table and long stretches of bark that circle it, make for the benches. Silver plates and katories were placed upon the table. "This is a Gujarati Jain breakfast," informs Anamika, "the moong and poori, make up the Jain part of it." 
   
There are large plates of the Gujarati snack fafda on one side and crunchy khakras and dhoklas on the other. One of the maids comes in with plates of fried yellow poories, piping hot. I spooned a dollop of home-made ghee onto it with a serving of the mildly-flavoured mug  or moong dal.  It was delicious. There is also a raw papaya salad, tempered with mustard seeds and green chillies and sprinkled with coriander. All this is accompanied by two varieties of chutney  one of them  a typically Gujarati dish. Made of besan, it resembles a kadhi and has jeera, coriander and green chillies. This, must be ladled over the dhoklas or even the fafdas to be enjoyed.  Of course, there is the mint chutney too. For dessert, there are yellow jalebis, with a surprisingly less amount of oil. Perhaps they were drained on kitchen tissue. It  seemed a good idea, considering the rich delicacies waiting to be had. The food is delicious and if this is breakfast, I could skip lunch, I tell Anamika. The breakfast seemed so simple when she told me what she had prepared earlier that morning. But it is evident that elaborate planning and preparation must have gone into it. The besan (gram flour) having to attain the right consistency, the dhoklas spongy, yet not  overdone. It was certainly a pleasant mix of spicy, sweet and savoury flavours. I tell Anamika she has gone to a lot of trouble over the meal. "I was never a very big foodie but I cook a lot now," she laughs. "Do you know, when I got married I didn't know how to make tea? But my in-laws are fond of food and my mother-in-law is a very good cook, I learnt to make khandvi just standing in the kitchen, watching her," she admits. 
 
 As we settled down to have tea, another delightful sight caught my eye. Out of nowhere, little squirrels that seemed to have been waiting for us to finish breakfast, scampered up to the plates, sniffed around and began to nibble away on the food. It was a pretty sight. One of them even made of with an entire poorie.

Anamika laughed, "You haven't seen the kingfisher, wood-pecker and vultures yet," she said her eyes in a twinke.

We move on to take a quick tour of the main house. The garden leads into a dining room at the ground level. The high-ceilinged room has some delightful kitchen art. And I discover, they're all done by Anamika. In addition to being a deft cook, she's a painter too, I discover! The hall and seating rooms are on the same level. The lights in the hall are the same ones one would find at the League of Nations in Geneva, priceless and a rare find. A large banister leads to the bedrooms. A very well-laid out plan to fit the vastness of the structure. It was built almost 70 years ago by a British architect, Claude Batley, whose works include the Bombay Gymkhana (1917), Wankaner House (1933) (now the American Consulate) and the Jinnah House (1935) all in Bombay. The man has done full  justice to this place. It befits the mill pioneers of Ahmedabad.

I thank my hostess for the tour and for a wonderful meal. It was an interesting discovery of the flavours of Gujarati food and more importantly,  their warm hospitality.