Mumbai Food: Pop-up in Parel to serve menu inspired by Haruki Murakami

In the worlds woven in Haruki Murakamis novels fish fall from the sky cats disappear and two moons rise in the sky Just like that In the very same books characters go about their mundane routines cooking spaghetti eating eggs and singing songsA food writer from Mumbai and a chef from Mangalore have put their heads together to create a popup menu inspired by the books titled Murakamis Kitchen Table by The Literary Table Meet Shirin Mehrotra who runs a blog Will Travel For Food and Shriya Shetty who has interned with Kelvin Cheung at Ellipsis and Gaggan Anand in BangkokThink an aglio olio style Udon with a pour of Cutty Sark from Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage This was the toughest concept I have ever worked on In my menu I have tried to add elements that have been mentioned repeatedly across his books mdash there are these instances where people like eating omelettes noodles and seafood Instead of picking dishes from the texts I have taken inspiration from imagery as well says ShettyFor example Shetty was moved by a setting in Norwegian Wood where Toru describes going on a walk with Naoko The imagery is of birds wet grass and a bottomless well I have created a balsamic pomegranate reduction depicting the dark well grass of greens like pak choy and lettuce and bell peppers for red birds The liquid is dark as in the text you cant see the base and if you fall into it you are lost forever I am doing a lemon mist This is an attempt to take the eater into the scene she saysPotter heads upThe duos first popup was inspired by Harry Potter characters last month A black taco with black garlic prawns and a charcoal khuboos represented Sirius Black while The Deathly Hallows was a sour dough with dulce de leche Because the starter of the dough grows stronger with time and is resurrected by adding more flour and water and the air is like the invisible cloak that makes it stronger their Instagram handle theliterarytales explainsBack storyThe germ of this literaryinpsired idea took shape in 2016 when Mehrotra posted her version of Felix Felicis potion and posted it on her blog Her dark rumbased potion spiked with jaggery and cinnamon went viral after which she made the potato pie inspired by the historical novel The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society A friend suggested the idea of a popup but I was not confident as I am not a professional cook I sat on the idea for two years until I met Shriya she smilesShetty on the other hand had already done a Game of Thrones inspired popup back in Mangalore Over WhatsApp calls and video chats the two created their menu inspired by Harry Potter charactersComing up nextIf I had to do a flavour profile of Murakami it would be ingredients that never go together but do There is an apt dish in his book Hear The Wind Sing where he mixes canned peaches with pancakes and coke Its ultracrazy 24yearold chef Shetty quips explaining her version of the dish mdash buttermilk biscuits CocaColabraised chicken pickled peaches and a side of chilled Coke to be poured over the dish Mehrotra reads out two lines of a song Modori sings to Toru Watanbe in Norwegian Wood 1987 Id love to cook a stew for you But I have no potThis reference turns into udon in clam broth with shitake fried spinach roasted tomato and chilli pasteAnd while you eat Murakamis words sip on Cutty Sark whiskey mentioned in Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage and hear jazz band Ink of Bard perform a 40minute set of covers from Murakamis playlistOn July 21 730 pm onwardsAt Savor Kitchen Jagannath Bhatankar Marg Parel bus depot Dighe Nagar Parel Log on to wwwinstamojocomtheliterarytablemurakamiskitchentable Call 9920554628 Cost Rs 3800Catch up on all the latest Crime National International and Hatke news here Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get latest updates