Sejal Sukhadwala is one of the longest-established Indian food feature writers in the UK, London-based Sejal has been writing about food and restaurants for nearly two decades. She is currently writing an Indian food dictionary; plus ‘The Philosophy Of Curry’, to be published by the British Library in Spring 2022. In an exclusive Q&A with Asian Voice, she spoke about the mighty Indian curry and gender norms associated to Indian food.
Q - How would you describe "Indian food" for westerners who still think it's all about curry?
It’s frustrating that Indian food has been reduced to curry, something I’ll be addressing in my book ‘The Philosophy Of Curry’, a cultural history of curry published next year. To a westerner, I would explain that ‘Indian food’ is in fact extraordinarily hyper-regional: not only based on region, but also individual cities, castes, sub-castes, communities and religious sects. I’d point to our rich tradition of steamed and fried snacks and street foods; and also explain the influence of international cuisines.
Q - Indian food is often associated and very wrongly so (in a patriarchal way) to women in most conversations. What is your take on this?
As in other cuisines, humble home cooking is associated with women, and innovative and show-offy restaurant cooking with men – even when those men cite their mothers’ and grandmothers’ food as their inspiration. Isn’t it sad that, while most Indian cookery writers are female, there are barely any Indian women who’ve made their mark internationally as chefs and restaurateurs? Why are Indian women, whose recipes are often superior to the men we currently see on TV, not rewarded with their own cookery shows?
Q - I particularly love how insightful your tweets are about cultures and history. How do you find time to pursue more hobbies and juggle work to make time for yourself, while building a voice on social media?
Thank you. Because my books are still in relatively early stages of research, I’m able to continue tweeting – though that might change later. I used to be more random and spontaneous, but have recently limited my scrolling and tweeting to about once or twice a day; and I’m more focused on posting about things I discover or get excited about on a daily basis. As for building a voice, it helps that I’m opinionated, and can be relied upon to come out with really bad jokes!
Q - Can you give us a brief about the dictionary you're working on?
I’ve been writing a dictionary of Indian ingredients, dishes and cooking terms and techniques for the past three years; and, as it’s already very long, I’m not sure whether to also include drinks, cooking equipment, historic books and important historical figures. It’s an extremely challenging long-term project, complicated by the fact that there are countless regional variations and names in different languages of every dish, and written historical information can be scarce, unreliable or difficult to access.
Q - What is your perspective on old cookbooks, diaries with handwritten recipes? Do you think they're still superior to the new age digital videos and flyers?
They both serve a different purpose – and yet they have more in common than you’d think. Old cookbooks give extremely valuable historical insight into what Indian food used to be like, and how it’s changed and evolved over time. YouTube and TikTok shed a light on how people currently cook, and encourage young people to get into the kitchen. But today’s digital records are tomorrow’s historical resources: what is Instagram but an online archive, available to future generations, of what people ate in the early twenty-first century?
