A Passionate Chef

Stories have their own ways to come together at their own pace and time. When Somashis Gupta dialed the number he was completely unaware that this call would end up knowing an accidental chef

What followed a casual search for a new recipe was pleasantly surprising. After all it is not often that you come across a person with such authority on a given subject. I mean who knew that I would end up meeting a culinary expert through the recipe of Rajsahi Morog Pulao.

It was a lazy Sunday morning in January. Exasperated from repeated kosha mangsho, my taste buds urged me to explore differently. I searched, I found, I called my dear friend Sid from eastindiastory.com to know more, and that is how I ended up knowing a culinary genius called Sumita Ganguli aka Mou.

“Hello, I wanted to place some order for lunch, where can I find your menu card?” I said to a lady who picked up the call.

“We serve you according to your need and would design a menu for you, what exactly is the occasion?” She asked

It took me some time to understand as this is new to me. I mean where will you find a restaurant serving you exactly what you need? I said “well no occasion as such, just felt like eating something different today.”

“Okay so how about a ….” She went on finding out my mood and actually designed a menu for me, more amazingly when the food arrived I realized it is exactly what my taste buds wanted at that instant. Is it magic? I thought.

It was after 2 or 3 more such orders from ‘Mou’s Cuisigne’ I realized I am not dealing with an ordinary restaurant. Something about the food constantly takes me somewhere else. I probed further and what I found out was even more astonishing-this lady has no formal education on culinary art. Her profession spanned from a sales person with IBM to a Behavioral Trainer with software companies.

“How come you create such great food?” I asked her

“My love for cuisine – its genesis, source, movements, transition, transformation, trivia and development, all led to choose my higher calling.” She said.

“But understanding and designing a menu according to the specific requirements is no child’s play, so how come you do it with such ease?”  I was confused.

“Well I was a Hobby & Consulting Chef since 2000 with hotel chains like The Taj, Park, Hyatt and Sheraton. Beside I was an empanelled cuisine consultant with the Ministry of External Affairs.”

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“Ah! So that’s how it all started. So when did you start in Calcutta?” I asked

“I started a restaurant called Call of Bengal in Hyderabad in 2015, but during the pandemic situation I decided to come back to be near our loved ones, and then I started this.”

“Wow that’s quite a journey. So do we see a proper restaurant soon?” I asked

“Well there is nothing called a long term now, so all I can say is to stabilize and grow MOU’s CUISIGNE this year and wait for logical expansion. In fact, we are now catering across 28 cities in India and find a flourishing market abroad. Let’s see, will cross the bridges when we have to.”  She replied.

It was quite a discussion I had with her, I was overwhelmed and only thing I could say  “Can you repeat my last order?”