No-flame kitchens keep restaurants running

How restaurants that don't need LPG to function are thriving during the current crisis

A sense of calm prevails in the kitchen of Padayal, a restaurant in Coimbatore. While restaurants elsewhere in the city are making tweaks to their menu due to an LPG shortage as a result of the ongoing conflict between US-Israel and Iran, R Sivakumar, the founder of the ‘no oil, no boil’ restaurant has been going about his routine with nothing much to worry about.

Padayal, a 'no oil no boil' restaurant in Coimbatore, serves meals and tiffin items that are raw. Here, a full-fledged vegetarian lunch complete with vada and payasam. | Photo Credit: Siva Saravanan S

“This is among the reasons I opened this restaurant and propagated eating raw food,” he says. He serves full-course South Indian meals, complete with vadaand payasam, that are 100% raw, also sharing recipes and cooking methods through his Padayal Academy. Sivakumar says that by following his method, families are able to save on LPG, even if that means making the switch for just one meal a day. “We’ve never had the need for gas cylinders in our kitchen from the time we started,” he says, adding: “Considering how over 600 families have been following our recipes over the past five years, one can imagine how much LPG we must have saved as a whole.”

A no oil, no boil dish | Photo Credit: SIVA SARAVANAN S

At Padayal, there is rice, sambar, puli kuzhambu, rasam, and kootu for lunch, all made with raw vegetables. “Our philosophy that food is medicine is now gaining popularity,” notes Sivakumar, adding that he has come up with over 2,500 recipes for raw dishes, including upma, pongal, and idli. A no oil, no boil meal may be a good option to try out at present. “It only takes a little getting used to,” says Sivakumar, adding that our tastebuds are so used to the vagaries of fried, cooked food.

At Padayal Natural Foods Processing and Training Institute in Coimbatore | Photo Credit: SIVA SARAVANAN S