When chef Suresh Pillai launched the #CookForKerala drive to raise funds for the flood-hit in Kerala, little did he expect the groundswell of camaraderie and support that would pour in from across the world. A network of chefs, restaurateurs and food enthusiasts readily rose to the occasion to do their bit for the cause. Inspired by the successful #CookForSyria campaign, aimed at helping children in the war-hit West Asian country, the executive chef of Raviz Group efficiently leveraged social media to marshal maximum support. For starters, he created a WhatsApp group, sending invitations to ‘his good friends’ from around the world, while also putting out posts on Facebook and Instagram, exhorting the community of chefs to come together to extend a helping hand. “It was not just Malayali chefs working abroad who showed the willingness to contribute in their own way. Many others were happy to help,” says Suresh. Taking a cue from the burgeoning trend of supper clubs in some European countries, many chefs hosted their own under #CookForKerala, with the proceeds going to the Chief Minister’s Distress Relief Fund. Take, for instance, the #Onamsadhya supper club organised by Deepa Nair, who runs The Gutsy Chutney, a restaurant in London. “I was thankful that none of my family members were affected (by the flood), but contributing to the relief work seemed like the least I could do,” says Deepa, a native of Guruvayoor. Deepa’s friend and cookbook author, Asma Said Khan, who runs the Bengali restaurant Darjeeling Express in central London, chipped in by distributing free lunch at the city’s bustling food hub, Kingly Court, on September 16. The money collected in a big cash-box set up at the venue will be donated towards rehabilitation work. Hyderabad-born globe-trotting chef Kanthi Kiran Thamma of The Spice Circuit has already completed a pop-up kitchen in Amsterdam to raise funds. He now plans to host another one in Brighton, UK. Nesan Thirunesan, founder of Nesan Creations Supper Clubs in London and organiser of food events with reputed chefs, hosted a Sunday Lunch in London and roped in Chef Bobby Retnakumar Geetha of Asha’s Restaurants in Dubai and Chef Sajeev Nair of Michelin-starred Indian restaurant Trishna in the heart of London. “Many visitors from the UK travel to Kerala for the holidays and so there is a strong bond with the place. We witnessed great encouragement for our event in support of #CookForKerala,” says Nesan, who is of Indian-Sri Lankan origin. Then there are restaurants that catered to the gustatory nostalgia associated with God’s Own Country. UK Diners’ Choice award-winning restaurant Dhaba@49 in London organised a five-course lunch on August 25, with a lip-smacking menu featuring the likes of coconut scallops, vermicelli upma, parotta, curry leaf duck roast, kodampuli pollock (fish), squash upperi... The same day, in Mumbai, Curry Tales organised ‘a vegetarian Onam thali’. Arranged Marriage, a South Indian restaurant based in New Plymouth, New Zealand, organised a ‘charity event’ on September 2, featuring a ‘traditional veg feast with 21 varieties of dishes’. Malabar Express restaurant in Karama, Dubai, is learnt to have managed to raise about ?4.5 lakh from a single day for #CookForKerala, including contributions from staff’s salary, on August 27, reveals Suresh. Some Malayali chefs, like Liju Pillai from Kottayam, working in Morocco, hosted private events under the #CookForKerala banner. Liju created a WhatsApp group mainly for the Malayalis and Tamilians he knows in the Moroccan capital, Rabat, and invited them for ‘a dinner with snacks’ on September 2. “We laid out naadan dishes like parotta and Kerala-style chicken curry and snacks such as samosa. Factoring in the exchange rates, we could collect over ?2.5 lakh from the single event, which we donated to the distress relief fund,” says Liju, over phone from Rabat. Chef Ranjit George, who now works in Sydney, points out that members of the Malayali community put up food stalls outside churches. “Some Australians are known to like butter chicken, and so we sold chiefly fried rice with butter chicken,” says Ranjit, who has his roots in Changanassery. But some restaurant proprietors, like Karam Sethi, co-founder of JKS restaurants in the UK, chose to help the cause in a different way. For the month of September, the group is adding a discretionary £1 to every bill across three popular diners — Trishna, Gymkhana and Hoppers — with the funds going towards the Indian chapter of Plan International, an NGO working for the rehabilitation and rebuilding of some of the most-affected villages in Kerala. “Most of our chefs call Kerala their home, so for us, this was a cause close to the heart. It’s been heart-rending to see images and videos of the devastation; especially being so far away made it all the more worthwhile to help in any way we could,” says Karam in an e-mail. It was not just professionals in the culinary world who offered help in the hour of need. Vany Varma, an IT professional who was inspired by #CookForKerala, along with her husband, Sajith Varma, plans to host a ‘fundraiser lunch’ this week at her residence in Northampton, UK, inviting Malayalis in her neighbourhood. Thrissur-born Priya Kiran, a blogger and writer, too plans to do the same soon at her place in Milton Keynes, UK. Some of the other restaurants and chefs who came forward were Asha Gomez from Atlanta, who has previously worked with Kerala Tourism, Hari Nayak from New York, Sandeep Sreedharan from Mumbai, Hoppers in London, Chutnify in Berlin to name a few. Suresh says he is also coordinating efforts to bring out a cookbook, Cook for Kerala, in both Malayalam and English, compiling exclusive recipes from over 30 reputed chefs from around the world, with a focus on Kerala cuisine. “The chefs have taken a vow not to receive remuneration for their contribution. The idea is to donate the profits generated from the book sale to help education of children affected by the floods,” he says. Too many cooks are certainly enriching the broth, at the end of the day. Crafting succour Cathy George, who runs a Peterborough-based cookery venture Crafting Curries that specialises in Indian cuisine, first heard about #CookforKerala through an invitation for a ticketed supper club event in London from a friend. Holidaying in Kerala later, Cathy, who organises cookery master classes and workshops, met Suresh Pillai in Kollam to explore the possibilities of hosting fundraising supper clubs in her own capacity. “Once back in the UK, the plan is to host pop-up supper clubs in London and Peterborough as part of the #CookforKerala campaign. Master classes on different topics and themes, like the spices of India or favours of Kerala, across the UK are also in the pipeline,” says the 47-year-old with roots in Ernakulam.

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