Tasting Darjeeling tea and green tea from Goodricke

I have always liked my tea strong, through my transition from milk tea to black tea. So my palate has always favoured Assam tea. Darjeeling tea has never really appealed to me, its venerable global fame (especially for its aroma) notwithstanding.

Green tea is also beyond my interest area. I drink tea in a reasonably healthy form (Black, with low sugar) in moderate amount and I don’t have health issues. So, I have never felt the need for drinking it for the purpose that drives most people to go for it, i.e. weight loss, preventing cancer etc. And on the rare occasions of my sampling green tea, I found the taste awful.

A few days back, Goodricke sent me a nice-looking, small blue tin of their Castleton Premium Muscatel Darjeeling Tea and a box of Barnesbeg Green Tea along with an invitation to a tea-tasting session. I couldn’t attend the session, but was prompted to taste the teas.

The Darjeeling tea leaves were soaked in hot water for three minutes. The brew looked dark, unlike the one familiar to me, but the taste was impressive. Probably, that’s the magic of muscatel. It is difficult to put to words the taste of muscatel tea. On the net, it is described as “an elusive taste found in some Darjeeling teas, most likely second flush teas. It is very hard to describe the taste in words, but it is easy to recognize the taste once you are familiar with it”. Rajiv Lochan, owner of several tea gardens in India and CEO of Lochan Tea Ltd has remarked that muscatel is “very difficult to describe but it is something extraordinary and rare.”

To me, it was rather smooth while not being a compromise on a strong brew. It was definitely far from as strong as an Assam brew, but satisfactory enough, and paired well with the smoothness. So it can please staunch Assam tea admirers like me. There was no apparent aroma, though.

 Goodricke Castleton Premium Muscatel Darjeeling Tea

Goodricke Castleton Premium Muscatel Darjeeling Tea is highly expensive, and comes at over Rs 5000 a kg approximately. A 100 gram tin costs Rs 525. However, those who love Darjeeling tea and those who like their tea strong but would like to taste Darjeeling tea and won’t mind paying some premium for it, can surely go for it.

I was less apprehensive of the Barnesbeg Green Tea as it came with a lemon flavour. But I liked the taste. The mild liquor was not bitter as green tea tastes to me and the lemon bit made it flavourful. Definitely recommended to all those who are open to having green tea but despise it because of its taste. Goodricke Barnesbeg Green Tea is healthier than the average green tea as it is completely organic.

Goodricke Barnesbeg Green Tea 

#Goodricke #DarjeelingTea #MuscatelTea #GreenTea #OrganicTea

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The big bang release of ‘Praktan’

As an impassioned supporter of Bangla cinema, it gives me a high to note the great job the makers of the keenly-awaited 27^th May release Praktan has done in distribution. Besides an uncharacteristically wide release in Bengal (last heard 101 theatres, by distributor Piyali Films managed by Arijit Dutta of Priya Entertainments), the film is having an unprecedented big release all over India. Most importantly, and as another first, this will be a day-date release which means the film will see a release all over India on the same date as Bengal.

In the 25 cities that the film will be released in, most do not generally see a Bengali release though they are known to have a sizeable Bengali population (like Lucknow, Kanpur, Chennai, Allahabad, Bhubaneshwar, Patna and Dhanbad). Bangla movies have a release (if at all) deferred by a few weeks mostly in cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Pune and Bangalore.

On top of it and as yet another first, Praktan is going to have a day-date international release in 8 cities in US and 1 city in Canada. The theatres are:

California- AMC Mercado 20, Cine Grant Fremont

New York- Bombay Theatre

Dallas- Fun Asia Richardson

New Jersey- Regal Commerce Center

Los Angeles- Brea Plaza 5 Cinemas

Seattle- Roxy Cinema

Toronto- Albion Cinemas, Woodside Cinemas

Bangla movies don’t see an international release for quite some time. In the past, a US-based organization called Databazar used to release Bangla movies in the US on a small scale but the efforts were not sustained for long.

All this is possible thanks to Eros being the distribution partner. This big and eminent production & distribution house of Hindi cinema and of late, regional cinema, has the necessary clout in distributing Indian movies in the country and international markets. Eros decided to back the Praktan director duo Nandita Roy & Shiboprosad Mukhopadhyay’s films after they distributed their last release nationally observing its success in Bengal (Belasheshe, a blockbuster of 2015). 

If Praktan is a success, a large national and international market will open before Bangla cinema from which it can immensely benefit.  The struggling industry is probably pinning its hopes on the film.

#Praktan #PraktanRelease #ErosRelease #USrelease #CanadaRelease

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The Spring-Summer Collection 2016 from Turtle

February saw the release of the Spring Summer collection from Turtle, one of the prominent men’s fashion brands in India. After its 2015 theme ‘Slow up’ (That is looking back at life in our fast-paced lifestyle), the brand takes a product-focused route this season to highlight its key ranges.

Here’s Kolkata Curry taking you through the lookbook of the collection which is based on what’s trending now. The highlights set by the brand’s design studio are bright colours, cool tones, playful, street-friendly patterns and bold textures balancing out subtle shades.

Playful with print

The range that came out in February was ‘Prints’. Printed shirts are eternally in casual fashion and the brand foresees it trending this season. It’s a great companion for a casual evening with friends or a summer invitation to someone’s place. Turtle has laid out its offering in subtle to exotic patterns on cotton, linen and Khadi in all-over and hybrid styles. In regular and chic band collar.

Unwinding after work in a twilight blue printed shirt hung loosely over rolled up black trousers. Sounds cool?

Now consider this dandy look with a printed black satin shirt in Ombre. Complete it with form-fitting black trousers and oxfords.

Wish to stand out amid your conventionally fashionable or boringly dressed peers and friends? Think printed tees. Pair it with the right bottoms/ trousers and carry it with confidence. For example, this all-over bird print tee, worn with cotton stretch joggers and hiking boots.

Turtle has prints in formal shirts too. Consider this pristine white base subtle print. If you are bored with plains and stripes at work, this comes to your style rescue.

March sees the indigo/denim range hitting the shelves. The brand offers a fashionable shirt collection of washed, engineered and naturally died textures in stripes, prints and plains.

The denim trousers range has wasted, distressed, structured and engineered styles in iconic washes and shades. Since the jeans range in Turtle has never really made a noise, I’m looking forward to this collection.

Play around with Khaki

The fashion forecast for the season has khaki as the runway favourite. Come April and Turtle plans to load the shelves with not three or four but seven handpicked shades of khaki- in stone, ochre, grey, white, sand and earthy to let you be boho chic. Work or off work, khaki can be your regular companion.

Think summer and linen comes to mind. As expected, the brand has laid out its linen range of shirts & trousers with cool, colourful and comfort shades which will be available in May.

This shirt in a pastel shade of pink is a classic linen pick and makes you effortlessly fashionable in the day.

Who says layering is not for summer? Consider this summery layered look: A powder blue printed linen gilet worn over a band-collared beige Khadi shirt paired with light grey linen trousers with a summer scarf wrapped around. Carried well, it can take your style quotient several notches up.                

Stand out with Khadi

I consider one of Turtle’s USPs to be the Khadi collection. It will be the last in the spring summer collection to hit the shelves (in June). Turtle is trying to redefine the low-profile Indian fabric by taking it to the fashion highway. Did you know that when it’s summer at its harshest, especially the humidity hitting the highest numbers, khadi can be your best bet in comfortt? This handspun, rough-textured fabric is known as the ultimate airy and eco-friendly fabric that will bring you the much needed relief in the most demanding summer. To top it you can take pride in wearing a truly Indian fabric. The Turtle khadi collection will sport a long range of stylish colours with natty prints and smart cuts. Give khadi a shot in your style statement this summer and become the trendsetter in your friend and social circles. Post selfies wearing cool Khadi shades in your social media channels.

For a detailed look at the collection, or shopping online, visit the Turtle website . You may also check out its Facebook page or Twitter handle for updates. 

#TurtleTrending #SpringSummerCollection #Prints #Khaki #Khadi

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Two new Facebook communities by media houses

Observed these two communities on Facebook recently created by Times of India (TOI) and ABP (The largest media group in eastern India) and felt like doing a quick post.

It’s the age of social media and print media houses have realized that they will lose connect with new readers if they are not what is now called ‘social’, i.e. active and effective on social networking sites (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc).

TOI being one of the smartest in the business, had started being social long back. ABP being the quintessential Bengali-run business, has realized it much later. They have set up a division called ABP Digital to spearhead their digital initiatives.

TOI has recently started a Facebook community called ‘Kolkotha’ and has been widely promoting it on Times of India, Ei Samay (its Bengali daily) and other publications may be. The community is dedicated to unleashing the talkative Bengali Kolkatan share his/ her endless thoughts on selected subjects. However, it doesn’t proclaim to be meant for only the Bengali. Anyone game for talking is welcome.

ABP had probably made a quick note of it and it soon followed in opening a similar themed Facebook community called ‘ABP Tumi Na Thakle’. However, having said that ABP is a laggard in anything digital, Tumi Na Thakle has turned out to be more engaging than TOI Kolkotha.

How? Simple- TNK is bringing up more things for discussion and setting the patrons thinking and responding (by patron I mean someone who ‘like’s a community on Facebook). And that’s precisely meeting its objective. Whereas Kokotha has been running its 15-word story contest for quite some time and doing nothing else (Remember, in the super fast world of digital, even two weeks can be ‘quite some time’) .

ABP is connecting to basic elements of Bengali persona- Sense of humour, sentiment, passion- through its posts on the community wall with nicely done creatives. Its creatives have a bright yellow & black colour palette, whereas Kolkotha has a palette full of dull shades aiming to give its creatives a vintage touch. To me, the TNK creatives are more appealing.

Here are some of the creatives from ABP Tumi Na Thakle and TOI Kolkotha.

The popular pun 'DiPuDa', which sounds like someone elder 

called 'Dipu', means Bengali's eternal favourite holiday destinations- 

Digha, Puri and Darjeeling.

Wish to come back again on this sometime in near future.

  

#TOI #ABP #Kolkotha #ABPTumiNaThakle #KolkataConnect #BengaliConnect #TalkativeBengali 

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you liked reading the post, you may visit this blog'(click on the link) and hit the 'Like' button to stay th the future updates on this blog and more on the page. 

Drop your clothes and make an impact

It’s an urge from the well-known menswear brand Turtle: Drop your clothes and be noble!

What!!

No, not a campaign for creating sensation, quite a different one rather. The brand urges you to drop your spare clothes at its stores in Kolkata this season so that people who are far less privileged get to be better clothed this winter, through its campaign ‘I dropped my clothes’. There is a canter as well, which will be moving in various parts of Kolkata to collect clothes.

This is the second season of the campaign, after a successful first run in November-December last year.

The clothes will be donated to the NGO Concern India Foundation who will distribute the same to the needy people. Set up in 1991, they have been extending financial and non-financial support to grassroots NGOs working in the areas of education, health and community development. Currently, CIF supports over 270 grassroots NGOs across India reaching out to 1,90,000 marginalized people directly through offices in Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Pune.

Apart from clothes, you can also donate money to the NGO in a cheque drawn in favour of it for this initiative and drop it in a Turtle store in Kolkata or at the canter.

The campaign was kicked off on 3^rd December by Abir Chatterjee and Arindam Sil, the protagonist and director respectively, of the upcoming detective flick Har Har Byomkesh at the Turtle store at the recently opened Acropolis mall. It will go on till 20^th December. To spread the good word, donors are encouraged to post their donation with a picture or video on the social media with (hashtag) #iDroppedMyClothes.

The campaign being launched by Abir Chatterjee and Arindam Sil

According to Turtle, the campaign aims to help those in the city who do not have access to basic clothing in the winter, thereby tackling a wide problem from the grassroots level so that they are able to survive the unpleasantness of winter by being adequately clothed.

Turtle is also actively involved in the conservation of endangered species of turtles across India for many years and recently entered into a partnership with TSA (Turtle Survival Alliance, an international organization working towards conservation of endangered species of turtles in multiple countries across the globe) to support the conservation of freshwater turtles around the world to help shape a better and more sustainable community under its CSR philosophy. Turtle’s recent #Savelittleshelly campaign has been a successful endeavor to promote Turtle’s conservation during World Turtle Day.

So it’s time to drop (before the mercury drops further), get clicked and share. Happy dropping!

#IDroppedMyClothes #Turtle #CSR

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The little ‘Pujo’ gem from Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury

The quintessential ‘Bonedi barir pujo’ (The pujo in old, aristocrat Bengali households), a humane story of a family that touches the heart, competent casting (including the brilliant Ananya Chattopadhyay apart from an impressive Monali Thakur), backed by wonderful work by a crew with established names…………and last but not the least, a masterly brand integration in this 15-minute gem of a Pujo special short film by Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury, called Devi (The goddess). Just to add, it has music by Anupam, lyrics by Srijato and background score by Raja Narayan Deb. I found nothing better than this in the build-up to Pujo. Check it out! 

And if Sujoy’s Ghosh’s Ahalya inspired this in any way, I am hungry for more such little gems.

#Pujo2015 #Pujoshortfilm  #Devitheshortfilm #AniruddhaRoyChowdhury

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Tea Treasures- the tea festival at The Lalit Great Eastern Kolkata

The approach to tea at The Lalit Great Eastern Kolkata is different from other star hotels. The way tea is served at its tea lounge reflects it (read this post). Its aim is to promote tea tourism in the city as it loves its tea and the beverage is an integral part of its rich history and heritage. World’s oldest tea auction house is from this city.

To mark the essence of tea and to revive the tea culture in India, it organized Tea Treasures, a three-day tea festival at its premises over 16^th to 18^th August. The festival was dedicated to tea lovers and tea connoisseurs and offered a platform to tea producers, tea marketers, tea shops, tea tourism operators and tea joints in the city.

Mr. Rakesh Mitra, General Manager, The Lalit Suri Hospitality Group summed it up as, “The Great Eastern Hotel, way back, during the colonial era was a major hub for tea trading, and various activities related to tea. With the aim of bringing forth the legacy of tea trading to people and sensitizing them about tea auctions, tea tourism, tea tasting and significance of tea in the Indian market, we have organized the festival.  Top tea trading companies, tea estates and tea auctioneers have associated with us to discuss about the different nitty-gritties of tea. We would dedicate the festival, in the years to come, to all tea lovers, tea traders and the entire tea industry, bringing all of them under one umbrella and present Indian tea to the rest of the world.”

The festival comprised of talk on various aspects of tea by experts, panel discussions, tea tasting sessions, tea workshop, tea auction and celebrity chats over tea (coinciding with trailer launch/ film release) with an exhibition with various stalls by tea brands, tea estates, tea joints/ boutiques, cafes, bakery, tea tourism players and associated products. An interesting proposition for those who love their tea and wish to explore it.

I attended the second day’s tea tasting session at the tea lounge in the evening. Mr Ravi Suchanti, Vice Chairman and MD of J Thomas & Company, world’s oldest and largest tea auctioneer (from Kolkata), with twenty seven years of tea tasting experience behind him, conducted the highly interactive session participated by distinguished people and a few bloggers. Tables with five varieties of tea and their leaves in multiple sets were placed at a distance for each audience member to taste the tea as guided by the speaker. We tasted the teas by themselves and adding milk and sugar. He spoke passionately and engagingly about the growing and manufacturing of tea, throwing in interesting insights. For example, no two teas will have the same quality even if they are plucked at the same time from the same bush. The quality is comprised of texture, mineral content, flavour and taste.

Few excerpts from the talk:

1. There are a few months between the first flush and the second flush tea. Compared to first flush, second flush is yellow, has more absorbed resources in leaves, mellower in flavour and smoother in taste.

2. Darjeeling tea, being hill tea, gets harder treatment in production than, say, valley tea like Assam tea.

3. There are  three stages of tea production-

     a. Rolling or withering- When tea leaves are plucked, they contain 77% moisture. It is         

     brought down significantly by three stages of rolling

     b. Fermenting or oxidation

     c. Drying- Air is pushed in. The leaves, still green, turn dark.    

  

4. The time for brewing tea is an individual choice. It should ideally be 3-5 minutes, depending on how strong a brew one wants. But for green tea, which is a self-drinking tea as he called it because it doesn’t need milk or sugar, the brewing time shouldn’t be more than 2-3 minutes, and the water should not be boiling but about to boil to get the best of the tea.

Post the talk Mr Suchanti took questions from the audience. Such a session was for the first time for him, but he handled it with ease.

 Mr Ravi Suchanti in the session

I took a walkthrough of the exhibition happening in a banquet on the ground floor.  The Assam 1860 stall reflected the new age approach with which James Warren Tea Ltd.,  is marketing this new tea brand which is their first consumer product. This one hundred fifty years old tea company has so far supplied tea to businesses like hotels & restaurants and tea brands. The Assam 1860 tea cart is travelling across the city to make people taste it on the streets. They are also signing up corporates to serve freshly made hot tea daily to their employees. Read its review in this post.

Also dropped in at the stall of Melete- a new start-up by home baker Anjee Bhatia from New Alipore offering handmade chocolates, chocolate cakes and truffles, brownies and savouries (pizza cup, quiche, ramekins etc). She started as a home baker like many others in the city and now has a workshop to cater to the increasing orders. As I like brownies, it was nice to see a variety of it in the stall. Melete doesn’t have a retail outlet yet, it takes orders. It also customizes desserts for its customers. Those interested may visit www.melete.co.in.

The Melete stall (Anjee at the left)

The handmade chocolates at Melete

Zee Bangla Cinema used the platform to talk about their new venture Zee Bangla Cinema Originals, which is a series of full-length movies made for television. They are unlike telefilms and have higher production value like a feature film. All the movies are premiering on television and censored for a big screen release later. ZBC launched the trailer of Bonolata, the upcoming film by young director Rik. Saw television director Anindya Sarkar talking about his film Choturanga which has been premiered on 23^rd August. Rajorshi Dey, Programming Head spoke about the initiative and Rik’s film. Saw director duo Sudeshna Roy-Abhijit Guha who came on stage later for the launch which I couldn’t check out.  

There was a discussion on the movie Natoker Moto, the film on well-known theatre actress late Keya Chakraborty’s life directed by theatre director Debesh Chattopadhyay on 18^th August. The director and cast were present. 

Tea auctions by J Thomas were also held as part of the festival to bring an experience of it to the visitors.

Such a festival paves the way to make the city a tea tourism destination and nurtures the tea culture that’s part of the city’s heritage.

#Tea #Teaculture  #Teafestival #Teaauction #Teatourism #Teamarketing

The perfect black tea to start the day with

I have always preferred milk tea to black tea. Black tea meant lemon tea to me. But of late I had been noticing that milk tea hadn’t left me feeling good. So I switched to black tea sometime back and fell in love with the form in little time. Not only that, I brought down the sugar in it, which added to the pleasure. Tea has a world of its own and exploring it in its different varieties is not possible with milk, I felt.

The comparison between Darjeeling tea and Assam tea, the two names closest to the mind of people in Bengal is a bit like Mohun Bagan and East Bengal. The basic difference, as all of us know, is that Darjeeling tea is about the flavour, while Assam is known for its strong brew. Each has its very own characteristics and superiority compared to teas produced anywhere in the world, hence has its own base of followers. And I believe since tea drinking, or for any drinking for that matter, is a personal choice, we shouldn’t compare greats and be content with our preferred tea- Assam or Darjeeling.  

I have always liked my tea strong. The kind made with a lot of milk and sugar and little tea has never been my thing. That’s why I don’t generally like the tea from a roadside tea stall. Hence my case rests with Assam tea.

Few days back I heard from James Warren Tea Ltd., a 150-year old co. making Assam tea. They wanted their new tea to be reviewed on this blog. It is a family-owned business with tea estates as old as the company, located in the south bank of Upper Assam. They say they are blessed with the finest tea gardens in the world. Two noticeable characteristics about their tea are that they make it single-origin and it is unblended, so one always gets the virgin taste. Also to retain maximum quality in the cup, they claim to do minimal processing of the tea.

I received a nice looking box packed with tea bags and a pack of tea.

I first tasted it in the morning, from a tea bag. I gave a full three minutes to the brewing. It came out perfect deep brown, with a light fragrance. And the first two sips told me it was a robust and full-bodied brew, just the kind I look for in my tea. It can give one the perfect pick-me-up during the day. They aptly call it ‘Tea as it should be’.

Those who prefer to take their tea with milk, and like it strong, should love it too. It makes good iced tea too and a recipe was given in the box. It is available on the brand’s website/ Facebook page.

Interesting to note, Assam 1860 doesn’t believe in the middlemen. So they have cut them out in the market and their 20000-strong team strives hard to bring the tea directly to the consumers, thereby keeping it fresher than other teas and affordable too.

The brand has a presence in social media including an active Facebook page, which I found pleasant to read.

Looking forward to continuing with the Assam 1860 experience.

#assam1860, #chaibaggan, #teaasitshouldbe, #India #AssamTea #BlackTea #KolkataTea #Lovefortea

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The Ask Me Foodies Meet-up

Ask Me is the newbie in online local search space. It differentiates itself by marrying deals, classified ads and e-commerce along with a dial-in service on a single web platform called www.askme.com. It calls itself “A disruptive new age consumer brand” which “Helps users to have access to hyper-local information 24X7”.

As food is no. 1 search category on Ask Me and happens to be a wonderfully interactive topic, to create buzz the Ask Me team has been holding meet-ups with local foodies in various cities, starting with and Jaipur. The Kolkata leg, which was the thirteenth in the series, was held on 12^th July at The Corner Courtyard. A large bunch of foodies (food bloggers, Zomato reviewers, members of Facebook group Kolkata Foodies etc) gathered to attend it on the Sunday afternoon.

To make it effective, the event was designed with was more of a mix of interaction and interesting contests than one-sided brand talk. The innovative décor of the venue (recreating an old house with courtyard, where it was actually held, decorated with bookracks and nice wall pieces, with old world charm all over it) helped make it informal and let the audience feel at ease. Randeep Kaur, Senior Manager Marketing (who sent out email invitations herself) helmed the presentation and she kept joking about making the ‘boring’ presentation ‘short’. Well, boring it was not; on the contrary, colourful and informative in a precise manner.

Let’s see what’s in Ask Me for a visitor. It’s primarily a local search service, so you can search for anything like contact details of mobile phone and electronic goods dealers, salons, professional institutes, restaurants and clinics. To engage with its target audience, it has built communities of popular topics- Fashion, travel, wellness, education, gadgets and weddings. They are packed with useful information and interactivity. For example the Fashion community lets a member create lookbooks, upload blogs, images, contextual videos; Travel talks about Bollywood travel destinations, i.e. locations where popular Hindi movies were shot, travel deals; Education has expert hangouts and Wedding has planning tools. It is also a deal aggregator, so you can find select deals from various sources featuring. Visit the site to find out more.  

The site lists more than 2 lakh restaurants & food joints and is present in more than 150

cities in with over 5.5 million listings. They claimed that there are many cities which were yet to have a Zomato and footprint.

To hook foodies they have soft launched a Food Ambassador programme (It’s not yet launched online). Here a foodie can write 10 fresh reviews and get a meal voucher for two and refer foodie friends to get bonus vouchers. He/ she can keep writing and getting meal/ shopping/ movie/ spa vouchers. Cool, no?

There are two ongoing series on the site-

In the Food section, there is 1000 Best places to Eat- Food experts Rocky and Mayur visit various restaurants and food joints across the country to pick names for the list of 1000.  A member can upload a video review of a restaurant. If it is liked by them, the member gets a chance to meet them.

The travel section has none other than Vir Sanghvi helming The Great Indian Safari where he brings to you choicest travel destinations in and abroad which appeals to various travel needs (annual vacations to weekend gateways) and all members in the family.

The audience got served a constant supply of a no. of finger foods (mostly veg though) and mocktails during the meet, including thin crust pizza slices and chicken satay which I liked.

The cheerful emcee engaged the audience in between sessions. The topic of favourite street food and its location expectedly fetched the highest response and it had to be wrapped up as it seemed endless. I was a little amused as some of the names weren’t street food/ drink, like Doodh Cola at Balwant Singh’s Dhaba or kochuri at Putiram.

Big reviewer on Zomato and food blogger Rajdeep talks as another big reviewer Rounak looks on

Presentation over, chef Chayan and Surojit from the restaurant took us through a session on food plating which showed how to present food in a house party. It was followed by two rounds of a food plating contest participated by audience members.

Food plating session on

Food plating contest- round 1

Food plating contest- round 2

A plate in the contest

Another interesting contest came up next where a participant had to taste a soup just prepared by the chefs and list out its ingredients. Those with most no. correct entries won.

It ended with a small buffet with live pasta (vegetarian again!) and cakes (cheesecake and chocolate cake). I, like many, loved the cheesecake and polished off a few. It just flew off the plate whenever it was refilled.

 The cheesecake

Overall an engaging meet-up where I met new foodies and foodie friends and had a good time over food. Looking forward to the online experience.

#Askme  #AskmeFoodiesMeetup

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The IPL 8 opener in the city- random thoughts

After the glitzy, uber-glam opening ceremony last evening the city filled out Eden Gardens to the brim to watch the home team play in the opening match against the biggie Mumbai Indians. And they were happy going back at short of midnight having seen KKR defeating Mumbai Indians by 7 wickets. Here are some random thought pieces on the match telecast. 

1. How much cricket it is remains debatable, but IPL definitely remains a well marketed property and still secures a good chance to get big audience. A match can be caught at leisure post work. One doesn't even need to make an effort. I caught the last part (KKR batting) sitting at the dinner table. Compare it to the recently concluded World Cup matches. Who would watch morning cricket?
2. Surya Kumar Yadav, the young new recruit showed class and great promise in his fiery, match-winning 46 off 20 balls which included six sixes! He will be watched.
3. Shah Rukh, thanks to an injury is off work and made it to the field with his self-proclaimed cheerleader gang of children including the tiny AbRam. This man can still embarrass the smartest of people having the gift of the gab with his wisecracks. On being asked by Navjot Singh Sidhu (the commentator) what the secret to his growing glow at this age was, he remarked, “ Bas Siddhu ji, bachche paida karte jao”. It was more indefensible as it referred to himself.
4. May be commentators will one day learn how to pronounce Kolkata, that it is NOT pronounced ‘Kolkaw-ta” (T as in target) or ‘Kawlkata’.
5. Last year Nokia and Rose Valley adorned the front of the KKR jersey. Rose Valley secured an enviable position for any brand- at the upper part. This year Nokia has become history and Rose Valley’s head's present address is Enforcement Directorate lock-up. So none of them have retained the positions. The front has gone to the rising smartphone brand Gionee.

The Magnum Masterclass in the city

Chocolate or ice cream? The answer would be either of the options or even both in one, like, a chocolate cone or a choc-o-bar. As it is, in the latter choice, chocolate, at least in this city, plays second fiddle to ice cream. But that’s going to change now, and your choice of ice cream will be driven by the chocolate used in it to take it to another level of pure experience. That’s what the Kolkata edition of the masterclass at Taj Bengal showed on 21^st February.

Celebrity chef Kunal Kapoor, who has been a judge in Masterchef India, came to the city to teach an audience of mediapersons a thing or two about chocolate and Belgian chocolate in particular and introduce it to the Magnum experience that drives home the point made above. Giving him company was actress Soha Ali Khan, a self-confessed Magnum lover. The audience was overflowing in attendance (perhaps for the pull of the chef). It was an honour for this blogger to be invited to the coveted event by Magnum, one of the world’s leading ice cream brands from Unilever. It was another pleasure to meet other familiar bloggers connected to the Kolkata Bloggers Facebook page in the event.

The masterclass started with the emcee asking to recall fond chocolate memories. Kunal told how gifting imported chocolates to girlfriends was fun and the fact that they were ‘imported’ did its bit to impress.  Kolkata being a city that knows its desserts, the talk shifted to what their favourite Kolkata dessert was. While Soha’s answer was a typical celeb type “I am torn between rosogolla and mishti doi”, Kunal mentioned patisapta as his favourite. Why, asked the emcee. Because “it’s easy, doable and full of flavour.” Full marks to the chef for being able to win the hearts of Bengali foodies. Kunal was fun and down to earth, cracking jokes every now and then (including at the expense of Soha) and slipping into Hindi often. His easygoing charm hooked the audience and stood in contrast to very starry Soha.

The discussion came back to chocolate and turned to Belgian chocolate, and the chef gave a short, enlightening lesson here. He asked the audience to try the chocolate pieces kept on the table- dark chocolate, milk chocolate and white chocolate. He told to break a piece of dark chocolate in the mouth and push it against the palette. That it melted away, and didn’t stick at all, showed it was good quality dark chocolate. He also reinstated what chocoholics know- White  chocolate is not really chocolate, as chocolate has to have cocoa in decent proportion and white chocolate doesn’t have it. The cocoa butter gives the chocolate its distinctive flavour, and dark chocolate has it in abundance, but milk chocolate, the kind that is popular among masses, has a good amount of milk fat that makes the taste different. Percentage of cocoa varies in chocolate. While in milk chocolate available in the market it is as low as 15%, it can go upto 70-75% in niche dark chocolates. Belgian  chocolate, which is legendary, contains a minimum of 35% cocoa, which is amongst the highest in the world. It gives the chocolate a rich and indulgent flavour and a high grade, and it makes it premium too.  Another interesting fact is that white chocolate will mellow you, while dark chocolate will keep you awake.

Magnum uses Belgian chocolate only, and the chocolate that goes into it is even more special, being patented for the brand by the biggest chocolate maker of Belgium. It comes in three variants (only in stick or bar)- Classic (which is your good old choc-o-bar), Almond (almond studded chocolate crust covering rich vanilla) and Chocolate Truffle (Chocolate sauce running into chocolate coated vanilla). It will be available in the leading outlets in the city from 1^st March and costs quite a premium- Rs 90 each bar (90 ml).

The chef, the star and all of us bit into Magnum together, and the first bite gave a distinctive crack that the product is known for. I had chosen the Classic. The chocolate was definitely distinct and its slight bitter, rich taste left a mark. The vanilla inside was top grade too!

Now, what’s a masterclass without some cooking? So Kunal made his special, Kolkata dish with Magnum, which was a spin to his local favourite- patisapta. It turned out a cone made with the pancake of patisapta (held up by a paper cone), and cut out Magnum pieces, along with khoya (milk solids), nuts, cranberry etc making the filling.

Photo by Anirban Saha

Kunal's fusion patisapta with Magnum

It ended with the chef opening the floor and getting his audience members in various round tables make their own versions of sundae using a Magnum bar and other dry ingredients provided at each table. And some tables did a good job that the chef found interesting.

The press kit was innovative. It included the soft copy of the press release and other support material in a chocolate bar shaped pen drive!

Fellow bloggers from Kolkata Bloggers group.
Group admin Anirban Saha third from right  

Looking forward to Kolkata loving its Magnum experience!