Friday, 13 June 2014

The Summer of '14!!!

Mumbai- the financial capital of India is buzzing with activities. And this summer was really an eventful journey for us foodies here! Big brands opening doors here for the first time, lots of high profile charity events, openings of restaurants with unique regional cuisines and launching of uniquely desi products! Zouqh has seen it all and today, armed with a glass of chilled buttermilk, let me pen down a few of the cute events I was a part of in the last few months.

Food-Blogging was taken up as a hobby by many, a few years back. We all took to it, loved it, wrote down what we made and/or liked. We read each others accounts, but that’s that; and we moved on to other things! Cut to now, and we have an association which creates foodie events to get all of us like-minded people together. Food Bloggers Association India has done an awesome work of organising our food-blogging community and has got us involved with other like-minded people. And then there was no stopping, through the FBAI, we were called to various events all over the city.



The first meet I was a part of was that of Jiwa Ata. Our humble wholewheat flour got a makeover with the third generation flour miller scion, Raghav Gupta. He created well balanced wholewheat flour which had a proportion of dehydrated vegetables, other wholegrains and salt. Though I am of the view that a roti/bread should only serve as the carbohydrate part of our regular meals, and fresh vegetables along with the carb should make it a balanced meal, but I do agree that the taste and the feel of a multi-grain roti is upped manifolds with addition of dehydrated vegetables! And the outlet in Bandra served us their roti rolls, easy indian fast-food, which is supremely healthy. The flour mixes are priced at a premium range of 85 to 150 INR/kg. The packets are available online as well!


The next was the fun ice cream making event at Hokey Pokey! I especially loved the fun of chilled ice cream, in the blazing heat of May. And the good quality of the ice cream shone through in each bite. I had great fun there and our flavours were taken as part of their signature creation menu! So the next time you walk into a Hokey Pokey outlet, ask for our creations and let me know how you liked it.


Kithcen Aid along with Vikas khanna invited us for his latest book launch at the super classy Art-D-Knox showroom in lower parel. The event was really mismanaged with no one having a clue of where the location was. The food served at a book launch of such a big celebrity chef was a big disappointment too. But the book ‘Hymns from the Soil’ was for the keeps. Priced at 1200 INR a copy, the big book of vegetarian journey though India was definitely a big thumbs up. I highly recommend it to people new to vegetarian cooking, to lay hands on the book. It’s a fine mix of desi food and videsi flavours, definitely a worthy try! 


Smile Foundation too extended a few invites to me and my family, which we loved and enjoyed thoroughly. The Cook for a Smile at Grand Hyatt was a lovely way to spend the Sunday afternoon. Hosted by Smile's Goodwill Ambassador Vikas Khanna and supported by PepsiC0 and Kitchen Aid along with Grand Hyatt, it was a beautifully managed event for raising funds for nutrition of underprivileged kids. In the unique cook off, all senior board room members of various companies came together in a competition on the lines of masterchef! These boardroom leaders came forward to pledge their support towards nutrition for better literacy and each of the participant took the onus of ensuring better nutrition for 50 kids from Smile Foundation. The surprise auction of my dream machine Kitchen aid stand mixer was the best part. I pitched high, but lost the auction by 2000 INR! We also attended Ramp For Champs from Smile Foundation, and little guy Ansh enjoyed the show a lot!

Dunkin Donots opened their gates in Mumbai this summer and that created a major halla. Burma Burma, a quaint little vegetarian eatery along with tea room too got inaugurated last month. Yours truly missed both these huge events. But my colleagues raved about them non-stop, and that tells me both these places are super for feasting!

Sigh!! Zouqh had quite an eventful summer this year. Lets see what monsoon brings with it for zouqh to taste! Cheers!

Related Articles- Other events of this summer that I have already blogged about: 




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