How this immersive dining experience invites you to explore 1950s Mumbai with a story

Meet us at the Crawford clock tower they said Heads up There are no lifts you must walk up three flights of stairs and wear comfy shoes The bustling bazaars of Crawford market often seem like it is stuck in time and now we were invited to enter another eraNew India Lodge Bombay Circa 1950 You enter a time capsule of a freshly independent India It is an interesting transient moment of meeting fellow travellers from different cities The lodge master a Mangalorean serves a welcome drink thatrsquos quintessentially Bombay hint itrsquos something berry Somewhere in the story you encounter a welltravelled man carrying a famous food item from the outskirts of Bombay A fusion dessert can be made with it Alongside you meet two businessmen from Gujarat with extreme opposite food preferencesImmersive theatrical dining is an experience that stays with you long after the meal is over PicsAtul KambleSurti locho is served with farsan for vegetarians and gustavo shredded mutton for nonvegetarians Both have a story Divya Rani director and producer of this theatrical dining experience explains ldquoLocho becomes a bone of contention between the two friends arguing about veg and nonveg food with an underlying message of the freedom to eat what one wants Considering the current political situation that hasnrsquot changed much since the 1950s but itrsquos a lighthearted fun take on it If I want to put farsan on it good for me and if you want to put it over gustavo it should be very okay Woven into the narrativemdashyou understand people their origins their choices and why they eat what they eatrdquoYoursquoll also meet a couple travelling with their child serving pothichoru a great railway or travel meal wrapped in a banana leaf It signifies the dreams of a welleducated lady who after she is married doesnrsquot know what an ambition or a career looks likemdashthere havenrsquot been enough role models She talks of the nine different items in the dish and how each one reflects her childhood reminding her of characters from her life and how now she can only have these lovely dreams for her daughter Lastly there is sevaiya kheer from Punjab with makhana fox nuts nariyal coconut and chuuara dried date and all of these are important in the story about a wife who lost her husband during the Partition and is trying to find him moving from city to cityCharacters of the play share food and entwine it with the plot of the storyBeautifully performed in rhythms and meter food is treated as an actor ldquoIt denotes what a young independent India holds for a single woman and what it means to someone who lost everything Freedom comes with repercussions how that plays out for someone makes the story interestingrdquo says Rani For writer Shubhra Chatterji the idea of the immersive dining experience started with wanting to pace this around a travellerrsquos lodge where people from different walks of life share time space and food The period came in later ldquoIt was a blank canvas slowly things started building We focussed on travel foodWhat is it that people eat when they travelrdquo she adds Chatterjirsquos experience of working on Station Masterrsquos Tiffin a food show that had her travel around the country shooting the food served on trains and whatrsquos available at the stations made it easier to make food the real shining star in the play ldquoI love the 1950srsquo60s India was at an essential point in her journey and personal stories from my grandparents who had to flee from Lahore on a train came in handy for absolute referencesInspired by period cinema the music and costume references are integral parts of the experience The story covers different themesmdashsome we are still grappling withmdashgender and food politicsmdashand is sublimely embedded in the story and characters The more significant idea is that of freedommdashof choice and expression As for food dishes with exciting stories of origins were picked ldquoWe chose food stories that need to be told unfortunately the courses are limited but we will add more laterrdquo says Chatterji Most days they are a part of the story asking them to move things around and assist characters move furniture or ask them questions As the main characters talk to you other characters are sprinkled in the plot reacting to the story and conversing with you Itrsquos not one way Immersion is createdShubra Chatterji and Divya RaniFor Rani the idea of immersive theatre came about in 2018 while visiting her sister in Mumbai Rani got boredmdashthere werenrsquot any good movies running restaurants were monotonous and clubbing had lost its charm for her ldquoI wanted to go to a place where I could feel inspired so I started penning down what Irsquod like to do I love listening to stories and I love food and that was this whole Ikigaimdashlight onmdashmoment for me So my favourite memory of eating is when I was in nursery Every time the lunch bell went off all the little tots would usher in this huge lunch room where there was a long community table and we all put out our tiffins that was such a pure memory because there was no sense of separation based on where you came from What do your parents earn If you ate vegnonveg which religion did you belong tomdashthese were just a bunch of kids happy to put their hands into the tiffin depending on how yummy or yucky that thing looked I wanted to recreate itrdquo she addsInspired by the supper clubs of London and the theatrical dining scene of New York Rani started paChaak productions to entwine stories and food ldquoIndia doesnrsquot have any dearth of good cuisine or stories and I wondered why people werenrsquot doing something like this hererdquo Thatrsquos how she started bringing different creative mindsmdashfrom the storyteller to the actors and the chefsmdashto come together and innovateMost days it is discussing what the chef is making what ingredients can they source whatrsquos the speciality of that dish and how can it be brought into the story by the storyteller and vice versaThen there are the actors trying to bring this to life imbibing the era and telling you the story of both the food and the plotmdashitrsquos a great jugalbandi of sorts The space is the third pillar creating an immersive experience for the guests ldquoItrsquos about time we stop living in silos The thing about a drunk alcohol party is that you forget that you met these amazing people and had a great conversation and the next day you are back to square one Here you are truly immersed in a multisensorial experiencerdquo says Rani