Created at Sri Kanteerava Narasimharaja Wadiyar Sports Club, Mysuru

by S.N. Venkatnag Sobers

In his recent interview to The Sunday Times, Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar, who has been adopted to the Mysore Royal Family of Wadiyars, when asked about his favourite food said, ‘‘I cannot say I have a favourite. But, if cornered, I would probably have to go with the famous Biryani from the Mysore Sports Club.”

In fact, he is not alone. Thousands of Mysoreans have been relishing the famous mouth-watering mutton biryani at the Mysore Sports Club over the past few decades.

The man behind the famous mutton biryani is Narayan, who has been working at the Mysore Sports Club for the past 32 years. Wanting to discover the man who created a Biryani that satiated the royal palate, Star of Mysore went to Sports Club to talk to this master chef. He is Narayan.

Speaking to Star of Mysore, Narayan said that members of the Royal Family including late Srikanta Datta Narasimharaja Wadiyar, Chaduranga Kantharaj Urs, Gayathri Devi, Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar and others were fond of the biryani cooked by him.

Mysore Sports Club introduced Mutton Biryani to its guests in 1989 and since then, it has been relished by many. Earlier to this, cooks from outside were invited to prepare biryani during events organised at the club.

Narayan said that he learnt the art cooking biryani through his guru Abdul Sattar, who lived in Mandi Mohalla.

“When I joined the Sports Club as a kitchen assistant, the then Secretaries B.A. Nanaiah and Dr. N.M. Srinivas encouraged me to learn the art of cooking biryani and since then, I have been cooking the delicacy,” he said.

Speaking about his cooking style, Narayan said that he starts preparing for biryani at around 12 noon by marinating mutton and adding necessary masala. Once the mutton is cooked, the half cooked basmati rice is added to mutton and is kept for blending for about one-and-a-half hours. Later, the hot biryani is served to the guests at the Club from 7.15 pm.

Everyday around 15-20 kg mutton biryani is prepared at Mysore Sports Club and not bit of it remains in the end. In fact, the biryani is so famous that even the non-members of Mysore Sports Club do not miss out a chance tickling their taste buds whenever they get an opportunity to visit the club. In fact most of the non-members demand the club members not to book them rooms at the Club but for a parcel of mutton biryani.

Given an opportunity, one must visit the Mysore Sports Club to savour this gastronomic delight.

source:http://www.starofmysore.com / Star of Mysore / Home> Feature Articles / Thursday – March 05th, 2015