A journey of flavours at the Copper Chimney in Delhi

Heirloom recipes and traditional dishes of India before partition and an array of accidental creations and modified dishes at recently opened Copper Chimney in Delhi, is a culinary journey of robust flavours

This is a story from the seventies: when a rumali roti went wrong at the hands of a chef of a newly opened restaurant in Mumbai and the owner got down to fixing the disaster.

Apparently the chef flipped the rumali roti on the griddle and forgot about it! What was meant to be a soft roti turned crispy and crunchy biscuit-like. The owner came to the rescue with an instant, innovative reinvention. He asked the chef to slather the roti with butter, spread a layer of finely chopped onions, tomato and coriander over it and top it with a medley of flavourful spices and sesame seeds.

Kadak rumali was thus born accidentally in the kitchen of Copper Chimney (CC) started by Mumbaifilm distributor J K Kapoor and ever since, the paper thin roti roasted on an inverted tawa and layered with masalas has become an integral part of its signature menu.

When the story of kadak rumali is shared with customers while taking orders, the item is a sell out. “Diners love it as a starter,” says Shikha Nath, the culinary director since 1997, who was in Delhi recently to assess the public response to the first outlet in the Capital, after CC’s presence in Gurugram, Chennai, Pune, Bengaluru, Kuwait, Kualalumpur and London.

Shikha is full of stories about tweaked dishes, which she compiled into an Autograph menu for the restaurant in its golden jubilee year in 2022. “It has dishes that were created or modified to suit palates by Kapoor out of his love for food ,” she says.

The popular chelo kebab has another story; That time plain cooked rice turned sticky and Kapoor transformed it into a butter and cream-rich rice pudding crowned with a variety of spicy, juicy and smoked kebab chunks, drawing inspiration from Iran’s national dish, the chelow kabab. He had tasted and liked it during his travels and gave the dish his own twist, says Shikha, who has also been working on a book that contains many such interesting nuggets about CC from the day it was inaugurated at Mumbai’s Kalaghoda by actor Dilip Kumar in 1972.

“Kapoor wove his passion for food with his personal memories of undivided India’s cuisine and the kitchens of refugees,” says Shikha. “I am a foodie but never thought food could be my career until I met him; I learnt the nuances of traditional food from him and built upon his culinary legacy that steers clear of any fusion and artificial colours,” adds the 62-year-old.