Three months ago, Josephine Tan opened iDelight Cafe, the first dedicated Singaporean cafe in Kolkata, with a nod to the memory of her popiah-hawker grandmother. But, she didn’t move to India to be a restaurateur.
Josephine Tan (centre) and her husband, Raj (right), together with their staff, are serving up Singaporean food like laksa in Kolkata, India. (Photos: Josephine Tan)Kaya toast for 70 rupees (S$1.10), laksa for 250 rupees and kopi for 80 rupees – these are some of the items you’ll find on the menu at Kolkata’s first Singaporean restaurant.
Singaporean Josephine Tan, 56, runs iDelight Cafe, the first eatery in the Indian city dedicated entirely to Singapore fare. Opened late December last year in trendy Hindustan Park, the young establishment has already garnered rave reviews from local content creators.
Here, you’ll also find Hainanese chicken rice, wantons both fried and in soup, soy sauce chicken noodles, mee siam, lo mai gai, ondeh ondeh and pandan cake. Food is handmade in-house, including things like kaya; while coffee powder, for instance, is authentic coffee powder from Singapore.
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The dishes most popular with guests are the laksa, rendang and char siew chicken, Tan shared, and even Singapore-style curry chicken, which is “richer and rounder, less spicy and oily” than what locals are used to, is well-received. She hasn’t had to modify any of the dishes to suit local tastes.
In fact, “many people actually thank me for opening an authentic Singaporean restaurant. I never thought that people would thank me for opening a restaurant,” she said.
“Some told me that they missed Singaporean food so much and eating our food brought back many fond memories. One customer used to study at NTU (Nanyang Technological University) and he showed me a photo of a coffee cup that he had taken at NTU, and compared it with ours, and said that they looked exactly the same.”
In addition to bringing a taste of Singapore to Kolkata through food, she’s also incorporated a Singapore flavour into the cafe’s decor, for example, through the use of tiles that resemble Peranakan ones. “I love the Peranakan style – the tiles feel like home,” she said.
She also “wanted to replicate the murals in the streets of Singapore – they give me a nostalgic feeling”.
Painted on one of the cafe’s walls, next to a kopitiam uncle wielding an old-timey kopi sock, a woman hawks popiah from a roadside pushcart lit by a kerosene lamp. She is a tribute to Tan’s grandmother.
“My grandma was a widow and sold popiah when I was young. I used to follow her in her tricycle,” Tan recalled. “She would sell her popiah at wayang performances, and she would have her mobile ‘pom deng’, a kerosene stove.” Additionally, “she also had a stall in a kopitiam in Lavender Street. The whole family was involved in preparing the food. Her popiah was very tasty and she was lovingly known as the ‘popiah shou’.
“When I was contemplating what to draw on the wall, I thought of my grandma who sold popiah, and me sitting on the back of her tricycle.”
Source: https://cnalifestyle.channelnewsasia.com/women/first-singaporean-cafe-kolkata-josephine-tan-462386
