Priyanka Naik - The Modern Tiffin: On-the-Go Vegan Dishes with a Global Flair

The Modern Tiffin

Priyanka Naik

On-the-Go Vegan Dishes with a Global Flair

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First Tiller Press hardcover edition November 2021

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Interior design by Matt Ryan

Photography by Melissa Hom

Food styling by Julia Choi-Rodriguez

Illustrations by Jennifer Xue

Cover design by Patrick Sullivan

Cover photo by Melissa Hom

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Naik, Priyanka, author.

Title: The modern tiffin : on-the-go vegan dishes with a global flair / Priyanka Naik.

Description: New York : Tiller Press, [2021] | Includes index. | Summary: Champion the diversity and versatility of vegan cooking with these delicious, unique recipes sure to break the moldProvided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2021005819 (print) | LCCN 2021005820 (ebook) | ISBN 9781982177089 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781982177096 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Vegan cooking. | Cooking, Indic. | LCGFT: Cookbooks.

Classification: LCC TX837 .N264 2021 (print) | LCC TX837 (ebook) | DDC 641.5/6362dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021005819

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021005820

ISBN 978-1-9821-7708-9

ISBN 978-1-9821-7709-6 (ebook)

To Maa, Dad, Kirti, and Puja and to myself, because who am I kidding? Ive been working way too hard not to!

In memory of our Aai, who passed on generations of technique, delicious food, and love through our mom

Shanta Devi Kore

September 14, 1935October 19, 2020

I t was a crisp fall day and I remember the smell of fragrant masalas warming up the house while I sat at the dining table refusing to eat my food. Yup, there I was, giving my mom a hard time about eating my dinner. I would be the first to sit at the dinner table to start eating and the last to leaveI wasnt allowed to get up until every bite was finished. (My family always wondered how I had such chubby, pinchable cheeks when I barely ate. But I digress.) Although I was a stubborn girl who refused to eat, what I didnt forget was my moms creativity and dedication to feeding us delicious and healthy vegetarian food. Neither I nor my two older sisters would leave the house without a packed lunchand Im not talking about a bologna sandwich or a Lunchables kit. Im talking about eggplant parm mini heroes; Bombay sandwiches, layered with fresh chutney, seasoned potatoes, and cucumbers; and spaghetti with homemade spicy cheese sauce flavored with Indian masalas, paired with a Frooti mango juiceall packed in a segmented lunch box, so as to not compromise each delicious component, similar to a tiffin (see ).

Traditionally, a tiffin is a two- or three-layered, stacked steel lunch box intended to separate each component of a meal. So you can have your rice or chapati in the first layer, a vegetable masala dish in the second, and a daal (stewed lentils) in the third layer. The concept helps retain the integrity of each dish and helps in maintaining how Indian food is traditionally eateneach component separate, not mashed up together in a bowl. My mom would pack our lunches in similar lunch boxes, but rather than being stacked, they were segmented school lunch boxes. Lunchtime was always my most anticipated period during the school dayjust thinking about opening up each section of my lunch box to unveil a tasty surprise was much more interesting than social studies.

In addition to taking our Indian-inspired packed lunches, we never left the house without saying a quick pooja (prayer) in our Hindu temple. As a first-generation Indian American growing up on Staten Island, it could have been easy to completely assimilate into American culture and lose touch with my Indian heritage and roots. But my parents made sure that did not happen, by teaching us our native language of Kannada, taking us to India every year, and most importantly, teaching us about our culture through food.

Life is funny. As I grew older, I began to appreciate the food my mom made, specifically her creativity with vegetarian dishes, and the fact that there were endless possibilities. As soon as I hit middle school, I was packing my own lunchesbig girl now!and eagerly cooking with my mom in the kitchen, while obsessively watching cooking shows. Some of my favorites included Good Eats with Alton Brown and the OG Iron Chef with the Chairman, Takeshi Kaga. The rush of excitement and adrenaline while watching cooking competition shows was unlike anything else for me. What are they doing to that appetizer? Are they really using the squash like that? That was not a good enough dish to win, come on! You get my drift.

My interest in cooking became more serious when the representatives from Johnson & Wales and the Culinary Institute of America visited my high school on Staten Island. I met with them and thought on enrolling long and hard. Ultimately I made the decision not to go. Youre probably dying to know why, right? First: I was not fully comfortable with the prospect of having to cook and eat meatI rarely ate chicken and seafood and was not interested in expanding my nonvegetarian intake at that time of life. Second: culinary school was very expensive, and I found it peculiar that there were no preprofessional courses offered in addition to the culinary courses. So, if I wanted to start a business or enter into a different profession outside of cooking, they didnt prepare you for that. And third (and probably the most important for me): culinary school is European-based and teaches the most Westernized standard in cooking. Through my research, I found that most culinary schools spend only a few days on Asian cuisine. Can you imagine trying to learn ALL of Asian cooking in a matter of three or four days? I dont even know 100 percent of all of my moms recipes, and thats from only one tiny part of India! My love for cooking was rooted in my heritage, so it wouldnt make sense for me to enter an institution that didnt focus on helping me hone those skills. So, for all those reasons, I opted out of going to culinary school and instead continued working on my skills independently.