Roti: Watch A Grandmother’s Recipe Becomes A Lens Into Identity, Aging & Belonging
The short documentary Roti, follows Grandma Krishna, whose recipes, shaped by a life spanning British India to England, are being preserved by her grandson. Through food, the film becomes an archive of memory and identity, highlighting how storytelling and shared rituals can combat elderly isolation and keep cultural histories alive.
My grandmother always had a thriving social life, which is precisely why she chose to continue living in Udupi, even after her sons moved to larger urban cities. She has always been fiercely independent. After losing her husband nearly 30 years ago, she had to learn how to do everything on her own.
Recently, however, she injured her hand, and with that, a part of her mobility, and her sense of agency, was taken away. When I visited her this time around, she felt different. A little more reserved, a little less like herself. She couldn’t cook entirely on her own anymore; she needed help bringing her cooker down from the cabinet below. These small shifts seemed to weigh on her.
My father suggested two options: she could move to Pune with him, or consider relocating to an apartment complex he had found near Udupi designed for older residents. She was, understandably, resistant, begrudging and even a little angry that her beloved son would propose such a thing. But when she finally visited the complex, something changed. She felt at home almost instantly. She’s been living there for the past month now, and so far, it’s been good. When I spoke to her on the phone, she sounded chirpy, animated, more like herself again. Most tellingly, she spoke about the friends she had made with the excitement of a young adult heading off to college. She wasn’t lonely.
And that feels important. For so many people, especially older women who have long tied their identities to their families, there is something profoundly necessary about rediscovering community, kinship, and a sense of independence on their own terms.
In a kitchen not entirely dissimilar to my grandmother's, another grandmother’s story of preservation, memory and family is unfolding. What began as a grandson documenting his grandmother’s recipes has grown into a layered exploration of the fragile threads that hold generations together.
At the centre of this project is Gurdial Kaur, aka Grandma Krishna, who, over the course of decades, has cooked recipes shaped not just by ingredients, but by her lived experience of movement across places, being born in British India and later moving to England. Through her grandson, Jay Singh’s lens, these recipes are no longer fleeting or passed on only through proximity and time; they are being carefully archived before they risk disappearing altogether.
Their recently completed short documentary, ‘Roti’ captures more than just the act of cooking. It reveals how food becomes a language through which memory is stored and shared and it reframes the kitchen as an archive, one that holds emotional, cultural, and historical weight.
At its core, it’s simple, just wheat flour and water brought together into a soft dough, rolled out into a near-perfect circle, and cooked on a hot pan until it puffs and browns, or as Krishna says ‘balloons’. But trust me, as someone who has tried many-a-times to get it right, making a roti only becomes better through practice. Grandma Krishna takes us through her version of this everyday ritual, a recipe she has carried with her since 1931.
But beyond its aesthetic and cultural significance, the project also speaks to a growing and often overlooked crisis: elderly loneliness. As families become more fragmented and fast-paced urban lives pull younger generations away, many older individuals are left isolated, their knowledge undervalued and their presence increasingly peripheral. This work pushes against that reality. By centering Krishna as a storyteller and knowledge-keeper, it restores a sense of agency and relevance that is so often stripped away with age.
Food, then, becomes a bridge that reconnects generations, invites conversation, and creates a shared space. The act of documenting these recipes is, in many ways, an act of resistance against forgetting and against the erasure of voices that have shaped entire family lineages.
Even though this project has received support and endorsements from Peter Gabriel, as well as features and collaborations with BBC and MasterChef, at its core, it remains intimate, rooted in a relationship between a grandmother and her grandson.
‘Roti’ reminds us that preservation doesn’t always have to be done through grand institutions or formal archives, sometimes, it begins at home, with a camera and a simple recipe. And more importantly, the ability to sit beside someone who has spent a lifetime holding stories we have yet to fully understand.
