From Khansama to Chef or Still, A Khansama………

During senior secondary only almost 60 percent of studious students decides to appear for PMT (Pre Medical Test) to become doctor or CET (Common Entrance Test) to pursue their career as an Engineer, but I was in another 40 percent lot, who just do what comes in their way, so I decided to appear for Hotel Management entrance test conducted by National Council of Hotel Management, India. (May be because I was not too comfortable with mathematics), I got through the entrance test and joined Institute of Hotel Management, Chandigarh. It was three year program and according to the curriculum of 2nd year, each student supposed to undergo 22 weeks of industrial training in any of the five star hotels to get them exposed to the real world of hotel industry, which is just opposite to the shimmering glamorous facade. But that opposite world of show floor also has its own charm.

I did my training in Hyatt Regency, New Delhi and during my training only I found myself fascinated towards the Chef profession, may be due to the respect, which they get in hotel or the crisp white uniform with black buttons and long white apron. I really don’t know which reason overpowered my decision to choose Chef as a life long profession. While campus interview I got through Taj Hotel’s management trainee program in food production (Which is considered as one of the best job to start career after hotel management) and after two years of training in all the luxury properties of Taj, I got a designation of Chef.

Now it’s been more then 6 years, I am working as a chef and till last year I had a notion that at least decent educated people in India knows about this profession and I used to give the whole credit of that to Chef Sanjeev Kapoor (Khana Khazana fame) because he was the one who had actually introduced this profession to the real India through his Khana Khazana series.

But an incident or a conversation had changed my notion about people's perception about Chef as a profession. I was traveling from Bangalore to Delhi and was waiting for my flight to depart, there was a person sitting on my next chair, after a small chitchat, he asked me about my profession and what I do? I very proudly said I am working as Chef. He said, what?
Again I repeated the same sentence that I am working as Chef, with a great difficulty to his tongue, he some how pronounced that word and asked me where do I work? I replied him that i for the hotel. So his instant question was, then what is this Chef? I said I work in kitchen, my answer was like a utter surprise to him, he said oh, “to Khana banate ho aap, Khansama ho’. I paused for a second and said “haan ji, Khansama huin.” On top of this when he actually understood the word Chef and my profession, he started asking recipes for his wife and himself. During that time I thought that all the pain which top chefs of India took or taking to promote this profession from mere khansama to chef has gone into trench. (I would like to mention that I did not mind his word Khansama, but the way he said it, I could make out his perceptions).

Here I am not denying the very fact that yes cooking is the very basic job of any Chef but as a profession in a whole its much more then just cooking. Today when in Europe, Chefs have reached celebrity status (Gordon Ramsay, Gary Rhodes, Roux Brothers, Thomas Keller) where people wait months to dine in their restaurants, but in India Chefs are still considered as just mere Khansama or Bawarchi. But in reality it is much more then that. Chef is the person who innovates, who leads, who manage, ok leave it, I don’t want to discuss job description here.

I do understand that in India most of the parents want their kids to be future Doctor or Engineer. But my point is, if decent educated people like that person will think so inferiorly about the professions which are not traditional and are different then Doctor, Engineer, Teacher and many others, then how they will guide or advise their wards or others to join these different professions.
Still, whenever I wear my chef coat I can feel that sense of proud and dignity. But I feel in India, chef as a profession, we have to go a long way.