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I, like most young adults who grew up with the internet and social media, had a complicated relationship with food. Which is possibly why my earliest memories of it feel like a blur. It was only when I was around 14 that I began to see food as an ally rather than an enemy.
But one memory stands out — distinct, vivid, and undeniably permanent.
I’m nine years old, visiting my grandmother during the summer. My cousin and I are watching Tom and Jerry when my aunt walks in with two mugs of Bournvita (which I hated then and still do). Then came breakfast: a serving or two of steaming white rice with varan (plain yellow dal), topped with a generous spoonful of ghee, a sprinkle of salt, and a dash of lemon juice. It was all about the proportions, and my aunt always got it right.
And of course, the pièce de résistance: the sweet lime pickle.
Food often carries emotions that go beyond taste — it can be a way of expressing love, or even identity. The act of sharing food becomes an act of care, and a portal to nostalgia or the new. We all have that one dish, sometimes two, that can undo us in the softest way. And really, who better to talk about their own comfort classics than the people who cook for a living?
Through conversations with five chefs at the top of their game: Ria Belliappa (Junys), Aarohi Sanghavi (Maki), Heena Punwani (Maska Bakery), AliAkbar Baldiwala (Slink & Bardot), and Gresham Fernandes (Bandra Born), we set the table with the dishes that shaped them, and ultimately nudged them toward the culinary paths they chose.
Breaking bread with your people is an intimate act. When I was new to Bangalore, the friends I made were somehow all from the city, so I’ve had this unique experience of experiencing this place through the eyes of a local. One of the first places I was taken to during my college days, was this small hole in a wall Andhra restaurant called Mangala. My four friends and I would land there at any long lunch break and eat enough to put us into a food coma, and from then on one of the many things that kept our friendship together was food. This connection of food with the community was seen in all my conversations with the chefs. For AliAkbar Baldiwala, food was always a medium beyond nourishment. “Food gave me the hope that I could travel the world through the medium of food, which was my childhood dream rather than being a chef. Some foods also evoke a lot of nostalgia, and always bring back memories. It doesn't really depend on the taste of the food but the environment.”
This feeling of nostalgia and child-like joy that comes from eating together almost always traces back to childhood — the moments spent sitting with family and friends while someone cooks in the kitchen, everyone talking over one another, and all of us eagerly guzzling down whatever’s been prepared.
For some, like Aarohi Sanghavi, food was a way to connect with her grandparents, and for them, a way to express their cultural heritage and pass it down to her. Food becomes an heirloom, and I see that in my mother’s kitchen as she tries to decipher my great-grandmother’s tattered Kannada bisi bele bath recipe every time she makes it. Food then becomes a medium not just to honour your legacy, but to share parts of yourself with people — to lay it bare on the dining table; spice and all.
For others, like Heena Punwani, it was the regular family potlucks where everyone brought their speciality. She remembers it vividly, saying, “I grew up in a multi-cultural community. During Diwali, my mom and I would make a lot of treats and distribute them, and then during Christmas and Eid we’d receive a lot of goodies.” Those celebrations are indicators that food doesn't just nourish the individuals, but communities, creating an ecosystem where care and joy is shared.
As Ria Belliappa explains, food has always been a way to form a simple yet almost unbreakable bond with someone — for her, that someone was her dad. “My dad is not the most expressive person, so cooking became his way of showing us how much he loved and cared for us. He travelled a lot, so some of my fondest memories are of helping him in the kitchen whenever he was back. He was always experimenting, which really opened up the food world for us.” In the end, families are so often built, and held together, around the dining table.
Finally, when asked about the dishes that nudged them toward a culinary career, most of the chefs found it impossible to choose just one.
Heena Punwani remembers the exact moment she felt her first spark in the kitchen: “ I was just experimenting, and because there wasn't so much exposure I only knew what it looked like. I started with the egg whites and as I whisked them, it transformed into a beautiful puff. That day I discovered the science and miracle of baking.”
For Aarohi Sanghavi, those defining moments were rooted in the women who taught her to cook. “My mother and I would make churma ladoos during Ganesh Chaturthi, and it became a ritual between us. My aunt taught me how to make brownies for the first time and it was one of those fun recipes where you put Coca-Cola as a leavening agent. And I was so fascinated and excited.”
And when it comes to Gresham Fernandes, the memory is beautifully simple: fried eggs. Sometimes, it’s the quiet, everyday rituals that shape us the most. When you strip food down to its essentials, every tiny choice becomes amplified, and there’s something telling about that. As he puts “The simple act of lighting a fire and using a pan, and breaking eggs in it. When I cooked those eggs I never thought I’d be a chef.”
Ria Belliappa spoke about how she drew from the simple recipes she grew up with to elevate the experience at Junys — from a pepper mutton dish to a humble chocolate cake. As she puts it, “The simplest dishes are often the hardest to get right, there’s nowhere to hide, no fancy garnish or elaborate technique to distract from the basics. When you keep it simple, every small choice matters.”
In listening to these chefs talk about the dishes that shaped them, I kept returning to that bowl of rice and varan from my own childhood. It reminded me that food doesn’t have to be extraordinary to stay with us; it just has to be honest. Food, at its core, is a memory you can taste. And long before it becomes a profession or a craft, it begins as a feeling.
Like Chef Gresham Fernandes said, “Whatever profession you are in, your house should revolve around the dining table and the kitchen. During my childhood, the central table was never cluttered with laptops or books; it was just knives and food.” This idea that the heart of a home isn’t defined by anything, but the people who gather around it and the meals that bring everyone back to the same place is silently omnipresent in everyone's story.
I grew up with two working parents, but some of my fondest childhood memories are still rooted in food. It didn’t matter how busy their days were — food was how we found time for each other, even when time itself was in short supply — from going to the local Thai restaurant with my mum just so we could share a plate of fried ice cream, or stopping by the Kadhai outlet near our house for jalebi. (In hindsight, I’m realising the sweet tooth is definitely genetic.)
And even in college, Jukebox’s pepper pork and Nagarjuna’s veg meals will forever remain etched in my heart — not just because they’re delicious, but because the conversations and friendships I built around those tables have become synonymous with their taste. Food may have drawn us in, but it was the camaraderie of those friendships that made us stay.
Because in the end, food is the great equaliser. It asks for nothing but your presence, your appetite and your willingness to share. So maybe that’s the quiet truth these chefs revealed: the dishes that shape us don’t just feed us — they tether us. To our people, to our pasts, and to the versions of ourselves that first learned to love the world through a plate of something simple, and made with care.
