Kathmandu:

There should be a sign outside The Mughal Kitchen saying ‘The Chutney Kebab Created Here’. The kebab itself is glorious in a deep green and tastes of mint. And it proves food writer Madhur Jaffrey’s contention that the kebab is still evolving.

Says the owner of Mughal Kitchen, Pramod Jaiswal, “People wanted a different kebab. So I took the Boti and added mint chutney and chilli paste and then grilled the morsels of meat.”

The Mughal Kitchen is in Baneshwor just after The Everest Hotel, up a flight of upstairs. The décor is ethnic, comprising huge copper pots for lights and smaller ones hanging over tables illuminating the food that Purna Thapa served, like the Shikari Kebab. It was chewy and brilliantly bro-wned, and was probably descended from Mughal Hunts where pieces of meat were speared and cooked over fires.

Said Jaiswal, “I wanted a minimum of spices and firmness to the kebab. After all hunters don’t carry spices around with them.”

Tastes of garlic, lemon juice, ginger and mixed spices or garam masalas brought the forests into the restaurant despite the fact we were eating mutton. There were layers of taste from mild to hot.

Chef Ajit Mishra, who is 23-years-old, comes from a restaurant in Calcutta — The Amber where I spent many lunches with boozy journalists. The Reshmi Kebab was a specialty there with its chicken pieces marinated in cashewnuts and cream finished with ginger and spices brushed with Amul butter to keep the taste in when you grilled them.

Mishra who worked for two years in Amber said, “I marinate the kebabs in the morning and change the marination everyday to avoid staleness.”

His Tangri Kebabs, which gloried in cardamom and garlic and ginger, were melt-in-your-mouth delicious. They were as famous as the Botis in Karachi’s Bar-B-Q Tonight, the restaurant where Benazir Bhutto took her guests. The Tangri is a marinated chicken leg and Mishra ensures its softness.

“I am aiming for a family crowd and professionals,” said Jaiswal as the Chicken Bharta, a signature dish in Calcutta’s Amber, was served. Fine strips of chicken in reduced gravy, lightly spiced and touched with cream made for memories. According to great drinkers in the 60’s in Calcutta, the cream kept you from sliding under the table.

“This is my fifth menu in one-and-a-half years and I am keeping our prices down,” said Jaiswal, who makes an entertaining host talking about his past in Thamel at KC’s restaurant from where groups of foreigners still come to Mughal Kitchen.

“Interestingly we don’t use cloves in anything but the rice, and that’s because cloves see to it that the rice grains don’t break,” said our host.

We ate the rice with the Chicken Dopiaza, which is an essentially Bengali recipe brought to Calcutta by the family of Tipu Sultan. According to Camellia Punjabi, this zesty dish uses either twice the normal proportion of onions or has onions used twice in the cooking process.

At The Mughal Kitchen, it was a dish fit for a Nawab with its rich taste of onions.

The Saag Ghosht or Mutton in Spinach is a Mughlai specialty of which writer Jennifer Brennan says, “It was a dish that was slow-cooked in the days of British Empire so that the lamb was rendered soft and mixed well with the spinach.”

But the lamb and the chicken and everything you eat at The Mughal Kitchen could find their way into cookbooks of the future because their interpretations are differently delicious. Call 4788888.