It’s a cold, rainy Sunday morning in Terenure village, with temperatures in single digits, a far call from the warmer climes of South India. But at the Spice Village restaurant, it’s nonstop action.
The combined South Indian and Punjabi breakfast has customers piling their plates high with uttapam and egg roast from the bottomless buffet, while staff deliver freshly cooked dosa and pratha flatbreads. Owner Joginder Singh and son Rocky say they serve breakfast to more than 120 guests each weekend morning, starting from 9am.
I’m having breakfast with friend, and founder of the Asian Restaurant Awards, Paul O’Connor, who has seen a definite shift in the Indian food market here. Tearing apart a golden dosa masala, dipping it into sambar and chutney, he says: “There’s a growing distinction between Indian, Bangladeshi and Pakistani cuisines, with chefs keen to showcase their own regional dishes. Many new Indian restaurants have opened, particularly South Indian.” Such is the boom that the Asian Restaurant Awards will this year add a new category for Best Indian Breakfast.
The Southern Indian dosa is followed by chole bhature, which combines a deliciously spiced chana (chickpea) masala with two puffed puri breads, reminiscent of little balloons. It originates in the Punjab, meaning that we have travelled South to North in just one meal. If I have to guess though, I think the South Indian menu is the most popular.
The current Indian population in Ireland is estimated by the Government to amount to more than 80,000 people, making it the third largest immigrant group in the Republic (after Polish and UK citizens). They have come to Ireland for a variety of reasons including for study and work, mostly in the technology, healthcare and hospitality sectors.
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More importantly, it is driving a groundswell opening of South Indian restaurants around Dublin and the country, disrupting the dishes we have come to know over the years as Indian food.
In Dublin city centre, Andhra Bhavan is the most prominent of the new wave of restaurants. It’s the brainchild of co-owner Praveen Madire, who first came to Ireland as a student in 2001. His route to hospitality is not the traditional one; he spent years working in technology before founding his own IT consulting business and medical clinic. His business partner SAI Reddy previously worked for a pharmaceutical company.
‘We don’t change the taste of our dishes from what you would get in India’
— Praveen Madire
When I ask Praveen what inspired them to open a restaurant, his response was simple. He wanted to showcase South Indian food and culture in Ireland, and provide an alternative to the restaurants with northern cuisine. With the growing Indian population in Ireland, he saw a clear business opportunity. Jokingly he says “Indians can eat”.
The chefs at Andhra Bhavan were recruited Masterchef-style from across South India and many bring experience working in five-star hotels. Praveen is proud of the food they cook. “We don’t change the taste of our dishes from what you would get in India. We don’t use butter or cream unless specifically required.” If a customer is a little hesitant about spice levels, the staff have been trained not to tone down the dishes, but instead guide them to gentler options that will still give an authentic taste of South India.
Praveen cites examples of diners living in Belfast driving to Dublin for an overnight stay, to treat themselves to evening dinner and breakfast in the restaurant.
This sentiment is echoed by chef Meeran Manzoor, head chef of the fine dining Rare restaurant in Kinsale, which was recently added to the Michelin Guide for UK and Ireland. Another big fan of Hyderabadi biryani, Meeran says he regularly travels to Dublin for a taste of home, food and culture. “Southern Spices in Sandyford is like going to a restaurant back in Tamilanada. The music, the staff, it takes me home.”
Trained in the classic French style, Meeran tells me he invested so much effort in his career, that he didn’t want to cook Indian food for a long time. “In London, cooking at the Metropolitan and the Dorchester Group, I was so into it, I devoured books and staged for free to learn everything I could. But when I wrote my first menu at Rare, it felt so right, so elegant.” Meeran’s food at Rare takes classic fine dining using local Irish ingredients and mixes through a touch of his hometown Chennai. “I only did a year of culinary school in India, so I’ve had to relearn through trial and error everything my mother and grandmother knew. We’re constantly experimenting with pickling, curing and fermenting.”
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A few days later, in the kitchen of Ruchii restaurant in Blackrock, chef Sateesh Sayana is showing me how he makes the fermented batter that forms the base of most idli and dosa, popular breakfast and dinner staples. Rice and lentils are ground finely with water, then left to stand overnight. The resulting batter ferments gently, nearly doubling in size. Sateesh has just finished making a spiced potato mixture, that smells deliciously of curry leaves and mustard seeds. He pours a scoop of dosa batter on a flat-top grill, spreading it thinly into a large oblong. Steam immediately rises and the dosa cooks quickly. It’s sprinkled with ghee, the masala filling is piled on and then the dosa is folded over. I tear off steaming pieces with my hands and dip them into the chutneys. It’s a glorious combination of buttery and crispy, and extremely moreish.
Sateesh says they face the same challenging market conditions that all restaurants now face. The menu at upmarket Ruchii consists largely of what we would consider typical Indian dishes: butter chicken, lamb rogan josh and so forth. Since opening, Sateesh and his business partner Dr Murali Sayana have experimented with tasting menus to raise the profile of the restaurant, but he says it’s the addition of a single page of South Indian dishes that has made the greatest impact.
“There has been a big shift in recent years in the profile of Indians coming to Ireland. In the past, students who came to Ireland didn’t have much money, they worked part-time in addition to their studies and didn’t eat out much. Now, there’s a different generation. Some have well-off parents who can support their children, while others have left jobs in India to pursue a master’s degree in Ireland. They have money and they want to eat out.”
Sateesh has introduced a whirlwind of ingredients, including multiple varieties of lentils, all of which are used in different variations of uttapam, idli, dosa and vada. It’s becoming clear that the term South Indian is a catch all for a wide range of sub-cuisines. I turn to my friend Balu Rudrapati for help.
An avid home cook, Balu came to Ireland in 2016 and works as a technology consultant. “South India consists of five states, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka. They have different languages and their cuisines vary, even going as far as to prefer different rice types. Everybody loves biryani though, especially Hyderabadi dum biryani.”
Balu cites Brexit and potential changes to the UK visa system as a factor in this story. “In Ireland, students have two years after graduation to secure work, plus it’s English speaking, and there is a path to EU citizenship, so more and more Indian students now prefer Ireland.”
Balu lists a wave of small restaurants that have opened, mainly around Tallaght and Blanchardsown in Dublin – areas where many Indians live or work. There has also been a rise in entrepreneurs offering a weekly food order service, delivering pre-cooked meals to people looking for a taste of home. These are proving popular with Irish people also, although he says that Irish people tend to prefer more meat in their meals than Indians.
It’s becoming clearer now why so many people are willing to brave a cold, rainy Irish morning, for a breakfast many many miles from their birthplace. It’s more than just a buffet, it’s a taste of home.
