�I rarely eat out, because the food at home�s such top quality. There�s my mother and sister, and we�ve got this maid from Hyderabad who is top notch. She makes a stupendous biryani and a stupendous undercut of beef.�

ALY KHAN, the popular anchor of the IFB Star Sunday Lunch show on television, describes himself as a foodie who knows right from wrong and stays on the right side of the line... until one wild evening! What happens then? �The workaholic can turn into a partyholic,� he says with candour, �and I can just go on a binge!

This threat apart, Aly is a serious foodie, more serious than his food show on Sunday will let him be, because there he�s got to keep things going... the participants and his audience, and he�s got a role to play. �I�ve got very adventurous tastes in food,� he admits, �and I enjoy all kinds of foods.

His interest takes him into the kitchen where he evinces a keen curiosity in knowing how food is created. �I do have a very learned palate, so I�m not content with just eating, I must know how the food has been cooked. It turns me on to find the one secret ingredient in a dish that makes all the difference to its final taste. Like star anise in pot mushroom rice. And dalchini in biryani.

Aly admits to having had a passion for food since he was a kid. �My mother and sister are gourmet chefs, and we�ve always eaten well at home,� he says. But his tastes developed in Karachi, which is where this Khan family came from, and where he used to go on shikars with his father. �I�ve eaten all the game he hunted, you know, quail, partridge, guinea fowl. And I remember going with my father on Sunday mornings to this roadside eatery where we would have great kabab-paratha and nihari-paya. I used to love going to the market places, too, with him and seeing how things are done there.

From Karachi, his fascination for food took off and travelled with him to England, where he studied, and where Aly was frequently called upon by friends in the hostel to �throw together an Indian� meal now and then. �But seriously, the only good cooking I did in England was when I had to impress a girl-friend I had called home,� he says. �I had the masalas sent to me by my mother and it was easy to prepare a curry dish then.

But... I can cook just about anything now,� he adds. �I know tastes, I understand flavours, I have what is known in Urdu as andaza, and I am naturally talented and somewhat technically adept too. If there�s something I do not understand I refer to Larousse Gastronomic (the Bible of cooking) or my sister�s cookery books. And I put a little bit of passion into my cooking. The rest�s easy!

Whenever he can, Aly Khan will watch his own show on televison. �I am a curious viewer. I watch to see how much more I can do, or what I should not do. Otherwise, I don�t watch cookery shows on television. I�m not the television type, no time, I would prefer to go to the cinema. But if I do sit before a television, then I watch National Geographic, the news or sports channels. No dramas and no films.

He is a Mughlai, Chinese, Iranian, Turkish, European food eater. The European foods are actually too bland for his palate, but a good Italian meal is always welcome, and he�s not averse to asking for his meals to be made a little more strong and spicy. That�s the way he likes them. He�s eaten all the unusual and exotic foods that have been put on his plate, but not gone looking for them. So while Aly has tasted frogs legs, ostrich, wild fern, all kinds of game meats and seafoods, he has not eaten crocodile or zebra or monkey�s brains as yet.

His eating habits are quite simple, otherwise. No breakfast, unless he�s at home on Sunday, or is in some exotic location like Mauritius, where the buffet spread is too tempting and has delicacies like smoked marlin. Rest of the mornings, he must have hot water and lime, three blanched almonds and vitamin pills. On sets, he will eat vegetarian food only because he�s not comfortable with the non-veg. Khichdis, chapati, sabzi, dal and salad. He likes his dinners to be light, too, and will go for stir-fried meats, a bowl of clear chicken soup and perhaps toast.

That does not mean I deprive myself,� Aly Khan is quick to point out. �I can go for a chocolate mousse!� He confesses to having a sweet tooth and will eat everything in desserts from chocolates to eclairs, sponge cake and meringues. �The nicer the better,� he says. �But not your Indian sweetmeats... except, perhaps, ras malai. For fun, I like to spike my desserts with booze!�

Is he treated like a serious foodie or a celebrity in restaurants? �As a bit of both,� Aly Khan replies. �But I rarely eat out, because the food at home�s such top quality. There�s my mother and sister, and we�ve got this maid from Hyderabad who is top notch. She makes a stupendous biryani and a stupendous undercut of beef. Compared to this, I find that I am almost always disappointed at restaurants.�