Chef Speak

The Italian specialist

Italian specialist Chef Bill Marchetti, consultant advisor to Blue Food's Spaghetti Kitchen, speaks of a recently hosted pizza festival and the fine nuances of Italian food. By Neeti Mehra

Chef Bill Marchetti, consultant advisor to Blue Food's Spaghetti Kitchen, is a veteran in the kitchen. Stepping in at the age of 13, he has completed over four decades with a ladle in his hand. "I didn't want to go back to school once I entered a kitchen. I was immediately assaulted by the noise and the heat and at that moment I thought, 'this is home!'" says the affable chef.

Half-German and half-Italian, the choice of grub at home was naturally Italian. "We had a lot of rich relatives coming over for meals because our food was so tasty," jests the chef, of his childhood spent in Germany. At age 13, his family moved to Italy, where he worked in a small family hotel in San Benedetto del Tronto on the Adriatic Coast. The port town was flush with seafood and so was the restaurant's menu. "There was nothing left by 10 in the morning and we had to wait for the next morning when the owner would get a fresh supply of fish," he reminisces. The fishy connection, he adds, explains his love for Kolkata. The family moved again in 1968 and the next port of arrival was Australia. At the ripe age of 17, he became head chef and devoted himself to nouvelle cuisine in the 1970s - an effort that won him a string of awards. Then, India called.

The Indian connection

Chef Marchetti's link with India was more spiritual than culinary. Since 1981, he has been visiting the country to spend time at the Ganeshpuri Ashram near Thane. "My spiritual quest brought me to India and the connection was so deep that even my children grew up with India's food and culture," he says.

So he moved lock, stock and barrel to the country “to escape ex-wives,” jests the chef. His stint was with ITC Hotels as its corporate executive chef for Italian cuisine for its erstwhile Sheraton branded properties, apart from operating the restaurant 'Marchetti at West View'. He then moved to his current job last November.

Speaking of the pizza festival, the chef says, "The weather is changing and it's getting hotter. The thought behind this was tasty food that is not too filling so as to put one off to sleep." Talking about the choice of pour to go with pizzas, he says its traditionally the beer but a fruity crisp wine goes just as well.

A flavour of India

Indians like flavourful food, says Chef Marchetti. Personally, he is fond of The China Kitchen at the Hyatt Regency Delhi, and Smoke House Grill. "A few years ago, Delhi was lagging behind Mumbai in terms of cuisine. Today it is not so," he says. His years spent in India have seen him pick up a smattering of Hindi, but have not seen him wielding the karchi yet to cook desi grub. His choice of edibles at home though is mostly Indian fare.

Explaining his experimentation with Indian food, he says, "You need to grow up with a cuisine and have a feel for it. For instance, I am fond of elaichi so I wrongly assumed that the spice in excess would taste good," he says, having learnt the hard way. "Balancing spices is important in Indian cuisine," he says.

But it isn't only the balance of spices; food tastes different in a country other than the country of its origin, given the unavailability of critical food ingredients. "Indian food in Australia would never taste the way it does in India. For instance, in pav bhaji, you need to use Amul Butter not Australian margarine. Australian lamb in a tandoor will come out dry and stringy. With the difference in ingredients, the end result is just not the same," he says.

Chef Marchetti is not a fan of fusion food either, and has coined a term for it: confusion food! Chicken tikkas and paneer shashliks will not find a way on his pizzas. He will not bend over to indigenise. "The pizza takes a different shape and form in each country I work. For instance, in India we need to add more seasoning and toppings to make it tastier. In Italy, pizzas are quite bland," he points out. Comparing Mumbai to Delhi or Bangalore, while the former has nearly 70 per cent of vegetarians owing to the strong Jain and Marwari population, nearly 70 per cent of customers in the latter two cities are non-vegetarian.

The future of food

Does the chef eat what he cooks? "Cooking is a giving thing. When you cook, you are already full to the brim," he says. He doesn't eat any particular cuisine on a regular basis. "I'm a hardcore carnivore, but I draw the line somewhere," says Chef Marchetti, who is also very fond of street food.

He sees Japanese cuisine becoming more popular. "One thing we must realise is that Indians are extremely fashion conscious. If one cuisine is 'fashionable', it will pick up quickly." Tiffin at the Oberoi Mumbai is where he gets his dose of sushi. Of trends worldwide, he says, "French cuisine is on a decline due to the nouvelle cuisine phase, which is tragic because French cuisine is exquisite," says the chef.

Voicing his views on the current inflationary climate, he says that it won't be the gourmand who will suffer. Instead, the impoverished farmer, and unfortunately, street food will take the full impact of the stretching rupee. Speaking of organic food, he says that the supply isn't reliable and is limited. "I can't maintain a restaurant on that as supplies are seasonal. Plus, the quality of the produce needs to go up," he says.

As an outsider though, he has a bird's eye view of the country and its dining habits. "In India, the cook hasn't changed; he is either a family member or a domestic help. But the expectations from a family member who is cooking have changed," he points out. This Delhi-based chef dines out five times a week and identifies a trend in that too. "The next big wave in India is the food services sector in which I would personally like to get into," spells out the chef, namely, home meal replacements. "We have not even scratched the surface. People will pick up marinades and mixes, pre-cut and diced food, and assemble it to prepare a gourmet meal," he predicts.

"Labour is expensive and one needs to reduce the amount of wastage. Thus pre-sized portions make sense. Time is at a premium so the kitchen will eventually become a mere assembly place," he says. This will take time though, but with supermarkets kicking in, he doesn't feel the wait will be too long.

The manpower crunch has percolated through his kitchen too with his staff swinging towards cruise liners. "Sometimes I feel I'm an unpaid trainer for cruise liners!" he says, bringing humour to a serious situation. But there is a reason for this phenomenon. Internationally, he points out, salaries constitute 40 per cent of total costs but in India, they amount to a mere 15-20 per cent. In any case, training is key, he feels. It isn't attrition alone which is crippling the industry though. Steep rentals are bleeding it dry too. Ultimately, he sees no escaping from food services and meal replacements even if it comes at a price - a price which is miniscule when one looks at it as a substitute for peeling onions in the kitchen.