Bank on her for gourmet food

FOODIE

By the time the BS team arrives at Jayati Puri's residence in New Delhi for this column, she has organised herself and the ingredients that she will use to cook us a full meal in a way that would do the CEO of an assembly-line facility proud.

Puri is married into the family that at one time owned Lord Krishna Bank (since then the bank has done an equity swap deal with Centurion Bank of Punjab, which in turn has been bought over by HDFC Bank, making the Puris shareholders in HDFC).

Her husband Mohan also owns Mohan Exports (it has nothing to do with garments), a company that hosted the recent Indo-Africa Summit in Delhi, as it has large business interests in Africa.

In fact, the reason Puri is so consummate in the kitchen is that the Puri family believes in serving mostly home-cooked food when they are entertaining, be it for work or play.

And this home-cooked fare is entirely put together by Puri, her mother-in-law and their cook, and the three of them think nothing of cooking for as many as 80 guests at a time. She says, "My husband is not keen on caterers. They feel that serving home-cooked food is the best way to entertain."

Puri's reputation as a gourmet cook means that she sometimes holds cooking classes. She says that for her cooking is like doing a job, and that she brings the same kind of professionalism to preparing a good meal that one would to any other career option.

Puri has indeed put in tremendous effort to master the craft of cooking not only by taking several classes over the years, but also by making it a point to ask chefs in restaurants that she and her family frequent all over the world for their recipes, which she then tries at home before serving them to guests.

"My mother-in-law knows how to cook," she says, "and my husband's taste buds are well-developed. When I try something new I will first get Mohan to taste it, as I trust his judgement, before I serve anything to guests."

This hot afternoon, as Puri meticulously goes through the exercise of cooking, it's clear that, for Puri, cooking is a craft and a vocation rather than a necessity. And we would that's a tasty vocation to have.

FAVOURITE RECIPES

CRAB-FILLED MUSHROOM CAPS

12 medium-size mushrooms
15 gm butter
1 stick celery
125 gm cream cheese
1 tbsp mayonnaise
2 tsp lime or lemon juice
1 tsp grated green ginger
2 tbsp chopped chives
2 tbsp chopped red pepper
170 gm flaked crabmeat
2 tbsp toasted and flaked almonds

Remove stems from mushrooms and then chop stems finely. Put butter in a saucepan and saut