What to drink with your Curry!

Indian cuisine is being appreciated the world over. The love for curry is legendary in Britain. So much so that the chicken tikka masala is now considered to be British. And why not? The tikka masala has its origins in the UK, where Indian and Bangladeshi migrants have set up restaurants and popularized the South Asian style cuisine which is laden with spice and chili. But strangely enough, even though the Indian cuisine has spread far and wide, it has not integrated into other culinary systems. You may well ask what I mean by that? Let me explain. Have you ever found chicken tikka masala on the menu card of a restaurant that is not strictly Indian. Unlike the Bolonese Spaghetti or the pasta that is now standard fare in non-Italian restaurants, the tandoori chicken is rarely found in any restaurant except Indian. One reason for this may be that most cuisine experts are totally at a loss when it comes to offering advice as to what would kind of beverage could go well with an Indian curry or a tandoori chicken. Should one drink it with a Cabernet Shiraz or a Zinfandel, or a white wine? Few Indian restaurants or wine-makers are addressing this issue. But I am sure that a lot of cuisine enthusiasts and gourmets who have a taste for international cuisine would have well found their own answers to that.

Recently during a trip to the US, my American friend in San Francisco took me to a sake factory where we partook of sake-tasting. The Japanese sake-taster who was explaining the different facets of sake to us noticed that I was from India and told me that he had discovered that sake goes well with different types of Indian food. Intrigued by his comment, I tasted some of the sake and I discovered that he was right. Sake, since it is brewed from rice, would indeed be the perfect complement for tandoori dishes and also for many of the heavily-spiced Indian curries.

Now wouldn't that be a culinary innovation of sorts - if Japanese sake were to be served in Indian restaurants. If there can be "Cal-Asian" cuisine (Asian or Japanese cuisine with a Californian touch), surely there can be a Jap-Indian cuisine that blends Japanese and Indian tastes in unique ways. That would definitely make Indian curries a tad more exciting than serving it up with the now-mandatory beer!