The Sleek & Modern Indian Special Occasion: Culinary Trends!

Chef of the year, 2016, Chef Aman Tandon adds his fabulous signature gourmet touch to your special occasions with his highly creative and widely acclaimed culinary masterpieces. They are specially customized to cater to the latest and popular gourmet trends from the world cuisine and authentic regional and rare royal specialities to make your event grand, memorable and truly festive. Here he presents to us how he pairs with the avant garde art of fusion while keeping authenticity intact with myriad forms of each and sectional delicacies customized to make your precious event memorable with his sleek, smart and trendy dishes that suit the tastes of modern, ethnic and global tastes of India world over.

Latest gourmet banquet and culinary trends in Wedding and Party Seasons for the year 2016 – 17

The food and beverage industry was once wedding-centric. Now it’s learning to do things in style, to match the evolving tastes of a young, corporate, affluent and globally exposed India. When I plan or start a menu like this it usually means we are going to have fun and it will be time-consuming too to finalize a lip smacking menu with one of the most balanced combinations of menu engineering.

In the first meeting with the host of the banquet, while customizing the menu and other nitty gritty of the banquet I consider myself as a homeopathic doctor, asking questions and getting a lead as to what kind of an apt menu/cuisine/taste/flair and fauna the host is looking for to enrich his event, because food is the integral and the most important factor to bring an event to success. In the spree to this starts the interaction about their personal tastes, the profile of their guests, what food they dream about, how many foreigners, the age groups, the Jains, etc. The clients usually come up with a grandmother’s secret recipe as well. Cuisine confluences emerge thanks to such meetings and more meetings.

Food Menu Selection for a sleek, smart and modern Indian Banquets & parties:

Food, along with music, dance and merriment plays a huge role in the great Indian gala banquets and thematic parties. It can be a grueling task picking and choosing the food that you wish to serve at your EVENT. And, before it all comes the big decision of which chef known for their creativity and authenticity – to choose. Read on to get a clearer idea of how to go about this food dilemma. After all, a grand, gala banquet is incomplete without a grand gastronomical feast!

Choice of Appetizers

Finger foods are a great option for starters. Not only are they freshly prepared and served to the guests as soon as they are ready, but they are also suitable for formal and casual events alike. Creative Kebabs, oriental bite sized street food delights – satays, churros, rolls, kotheys, siu mai, wraps, etc., are a good idea, and you can even have a good mix of both vegetarian an non-vegetarian options. A pot of cheese fondue with marshmallows and crackers on each table is a great idea to keep your guests satisfied while they take a break from the starters that keep coming around.

Here are some tips on how to serve finger food:

• Snacks with a twist at your celebration!!
• Creative garnishing and unique presentation of bite sized snacks will interest guests.
• Using uniquely shaped platters is another interesting concept. Also instead of just restricting to platters you can opt for edible spoons or plates (made out of fruit, vegetables etc) served on artistic acrylic platters instead of ceramic or silver platters.
• Welcome shooters instead of welcome drinks. These can be served in Tequila , martini glasses.
• Serving rolls can be made into smaller sizes and wrap them individually with fries in small brown paper cones with the design or initials of the couple on it.
• Serve barbecued food like tikkas. The service personnel can carry small barbecues on salvers and serve the tikkas on individual bamboo skewers.  Another great idea is to serve drinks from steel stand carriers instead of serving them on salvers.
The latest trend is to keep the portions small so that guests can try more options yet leave space for the main feast. Depending on your theme you can add other elements. We also suggest the use of personalized cocktail napkins with the names of the couple, the monogram and the date.

The Main Course

One plans whether it will be a buffet service, or a table service with a TDH meal for everyone. The right idea, is to select a good combination of dishes that will be offered at menu spreads with emphasis upon vegetarian menu or a mix of vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes. Salads of different kinds add a good balance to the food served in selected service setting. Rice, bread and Indian breads are all a must.

Then come the accompaniments like different Indian gravy concoctions and emphasis upon cuisines like Chinese, Italian, Thai etc. I recommend to have a couple of popular combos of different kinds of cuisines. Chinese and Thai food would go well for instance. And, you can get really creative in the case of appetizers, live stations, combos matching the preferred food tastes and modernism of cuisine. Also, you can opt for a platter of cold cuts like turkey, proscuito ham, chorizo, pate, terrine and salami that are not only delicious but also make for a good presentable dish, if served right on the buffet table. A party/banquet of traditional Indian Cuisine and World Cuisine is de rigueur among the hippest spreads of the year. With increasingly sophisticated guests arriving at the celebration, a majority of hosts choose to present their favorite dishes from a multitude of ethnicities for their banqueting feast.With thematic feasts in vogue, guests this year adore live juggling, mocktail bars with thumping thematic music and stylish bartending flair. Custom-made saffron and rose-petal jam, flaming mocktails and chocolate cigars, hand-tossed pizzas, hand-rolled sushi, white truffles and artichokes, Norwegian salmon, New Zealand lamb chops but also halibut, live grills, live paturi counters and live pasta stations are a trendy favorite among the hosts and guests alike.

Innovative menus:

Appetizers have some favourite picks this season – from the live station- veg/non veg Oriental Street food satay, the Lebanese shawarma cocktail rhapsodies, Ondhiyu bouchees, Belgian chocolate sushis with lip smacking fruity dips, yummy Canapés. Barbequed cheeses, Roasted & exotically marinated veggies and succulent non veg, sundry tomato and basil vol-au- vents with parmesan crisps. Mini crunchy baskets with all spice flavored cheese, steamed asparagus and fresh lollo rosso and rocket greens, watermelon pave with spicy tomato salsa and chervil. Grilled eggplant involtini with nutty dips. Pan-seared polenta cakes stuffed with spinach and gouda and roasted pine nuts @ the Live Station. Spinach espuma with thyme flavored mushroom alio olio and spicy corn. Four cheese ravioli with Butter and sage sauce. Original sichuan style hand pulled noodles with spicy veg or non veg stock and toppings. Tibetan style steamed dim sums served with flavorful stock and chilly sauce. Cheese, green chilly and coriander stem stuffed pan-fried cottage cheese in phylo pastry. Steamed patrani machchi. Coriander, green chillies and coconut stuffed steamed fish wrapped in banana leaf.

Twist in gourmet style:

Nowadays a trend has emerged to incorporate the family’s cultural diversity into the food by selecting dishes from the Punjabi, Bengali and Gujrati regions and transforming them into bite sized passed hors d oeuvres, reflecting the global lifestyle and affluent upbringing.

Traditional baigan bharta became an eggplant permigianni gratin i.e smoked baigan bharta with a hint of mint – served into crispy pre marinated aubergine pouches and baked with english cheddar, Tandoori Pomphrets served standing with a fusion of lemony pesto and chettinadu kulchas on tawa with indonasian rice cake rolls – Lontongs along with mirchi ka salan to substitute in curry etc, such creative and novel food combinations typically speaking a gourmet style of an aptly balanced fusion becomes a giant hit with guests.

The cuisine served at the Parties is no longer only served buffet-style. This year, brides have done everything from French-style seated dinners to Family-Style intimate meals to small butlered plates, showing a true fusion of Indian and American style.

The incorporation of both the guests and host’s heritages and tastes is the most important thing to me. A true banquet menu set up of old and new traditions, Indian and Global Cuisine and innovative approaches to cuisine and service are the mark of a truly wonderful and memorable wedding/banquet.

Dessert Spread

While you are planning your Party menus, there’s one tasting that is always a popular one Scrumptious desserts! It’s no secret that Indian grand gala Banquets are the occasion to go all out where the food and catering is concerned, and you have to have the perfect sweet ending. When people think of desserts it’s normally either staple Indian sweets and sweet dishes or something like cake or mousse. With dessert section cuisine getting more and more creative each day, why should the treats be left behind?! Let’s a take a look at a few ways you can spice up your dessert menu.

Dessert drinks: 

There’s no reason why your wedding desserts can’t be in liquid form and dessert shots are the new rage. Non-alcoholic and alcoholic dessert drinks are a great option after a heavy Indian meal. One of the creative ways to incorporate this in your Indian wedding is to have shots of rich, fruity and colourful lassis, faloodas or milkshakes. Bottoms up!

A Sundae bar:

Having an ice-cream sundae bar or a live cold stone ice cream sundae station is fun and different and gives your guests the opportunity to create a dessert that they love. Have a couple of basic ice-cream flavours at least and a wide variety of toppings like chocolate, candies, nuts, sauces and even pieces of Indian seasonal fresh fruits like mangos, sitaphal, chikoo etc. For a tasty Indian touch have pieces of delicious mithais like gulab jamuns, jalebis and halwa to mix into your ice-cream concoction too. Yum…

Fusion desserts:

Fusion fare is all the rage and a nice way to incorporate different global tastes into one small, sweet morsel. If you prefer western desserts in your MENU, you could consider having them made with a dash of Indian spices and flavors to shake things up, like chai flavoured ice-cream, cake with essences of saffron and cardamom or rose, chocolate mousse with a pinch of spice and coconut etc.

Small bites or Morsel portions:

Mini desserts, like the shots, are a perfect guilty pleasure without the stress of an expanding waistline…and a nice ending to a spicy Indian meal. It also allows you to sample a couple of sweets without getting too stuffed. Let us know how you are planning to spice up your party menu with our modern dessert inspiration! 

The trend is catching up and couples are now laying more stress on presentation and service of food & beverage at Indian parties and weddings. Always supervise the service to ensure all your guests are well taken care of on your Big day The Culinary Dome at The Pride Hotel, where every menu is customized as per the tastes, choices and preferences of the host, help you plan a good event menu, help work with the presentation of the food and beverage.