Author Prajwal Parajuly on why chutney, not idli, is his go-to dish
All delightful experiences, no doubt, but mere footnotes to the one thing that would bring me back to Chennai again and again: the humble idli chutney. The array of chutneys at Murugan Idli, to be specific.
I didn't know what a preoccupation these chutneys would become when I first made my way to the GN Road outlet at T Nagar. An innocuous idli was plonked on my banana leaf, on top which the waiter ladled out a generous portion of sambhar. There they were in white, green, and two varieties of orange — a quartet of chutneys so flavourful that the idli seemed like an afterthought. There was just the right hint of piquancy, and what was that I tasted? It was sesame, its lavish use genius. I went to Murugan again for dinner and returned for lunch the next day.
It is now almost always my first stop when I get into Chennai.
What is it about Murugan? It is unassuming. But that can be said for any number of Chennai eateries. The service is indifferent on a good day and infuriating on most days. No one will go to any of the outlets for the ambience either. If I am not going for the vibes or the service, why would I submit myself to a meal — sometimes two meals — a day? It's because I am a chutney addict through and through. Nothing else matters — not the crisp rava dosa nor the sambhar. Neither the fluffy idli nor the inoffensive uttapam. I eat the chutneys — dollops and dollops of them — like they are the main course and the idli, the accompaniment. How I love making snaky rivulets on the banana leaf with my fingers, mixing and matching one, two, three or four chutneys with a smidgen of idli, and guiding the concoction to my mouth as it drips down my elbow, yellowing my shirt, and filling my gluttonous heart with unbridled joy.
I'd soon realise that few topics polarise Chennai more than Murugan Idli. For each foodie who unequivocally declares the restaurant as her favourite, there's the one who froths at his mouth recounting its circumspect hygiene. 'Went … a month ago, and it was ghastly,' pronounces my editor, not one to mince words. There are those for whom the lack of consistency jars. 'I'll only go to the one across from the Armenian church,' my colleague Kaveri once declared. My sister points out that in a city brimming with excellent food, Murugan is middling, but she also forks and knifes her dosa, so her opinion doesn't count. Eating Circles any day, some say. There are then the Sangeetha militants. No self-respecting Sangeetha loyalist will out himself as a Murugan fan.
Sure, not every Murugan is created equal. I'll set foot in the Besant Nagar location only for takeaway chutneys and nothing else. Not one dosa I have eaten there has come out warm. Plus, in a neighborhood with Native Tiffins and Vishranti — the idli at the former is so well fermented that it renders the chutney useless — a lack-lustre Murugan is just wrath-inducing. I've given the outlet three (three!) chances, and I fully sympathise with those who are unconvinced of Murugan's greatness because it's the one location that can't get anything right. That doesn't mean I will not judge these Murugan haters for dismissing my beloved chain altogether. I shall judge them almost as severely as I do those food writers who describe the idli as a rice cake, the dosa as a crepe and — the biggest horror — the chutney as a kind of pickle.
Friends joke that I am responsible for quadrupling Murugan's profits. But they are wrong. Idli is cheap food. I feel awful that the fourth, fifth and sixth free chutney helpings likely cost more than the 23 rupees per idli that I am charged. To circumvent this guilt, I invariably order a rava masala onion dosa, eating which requires … another few ladles of chutney. I return to Sri City with more chutney than blood in my veins.
Prajwal Parajuly is the author of The Gurkha's Daughter and Land Where I Flee. He loves idli, loathes naan, and is indifferent to coffee. He teaches Creative Writing at Krea University and oscillates between New York City and Sri City.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Hindu
a day ago
- The Hindu
Author Prajwal Parajuly writes a love letter to Chennai on its 386th birthday
Happy Birthday, Chennai. I have known you somewhat intimately for about a year. It's been a journey and a half. When I first landed in you last year, I was crestfallen. I had flown in from Singapore, which, if aviation nerds are to be trusted, has the best airport in the world, and was warned, again and again, to rein in my expectations for the city I'd soon call home. I arrived in the middle of the night, wide-eyed and brimming with optimism. Your airport, I concluded, should be converted into a barn. I prayed you would be nothing like it. I started exploring you by staying in the nicer hotels, equal parts gleeful and uncomfortable with their interpretation of hospitality. I moved to the Madras Club, whose shortcomings I ignored because I paid less than half for a room there than I did in your posh hotels. Soon, I rented my own weekend place, because I wanted to call a little slice of you home. I continue to enjoy my wacky living arrangement, which I share with Pagir, a community art space. Some days, I wake up to music on the terrace. Other days, it is thumping feet. A few weekends ago, it was a singing conch. I miss you when I am gone for extended periods. When I have been here a while, I relentlessly complain about you. You're not a pretty city, even if wounded locals will claim some parts of you are breathtaking. You're not a walker's city, unless walker-friendliness is restricted to the beach. You could do with more accessible green spaces. Yet I rhapsodise about you week after week in this column. I like you because of the food I find in you. Take Avartana, for instance. As an avowed repository of insufferable declarations, I will not let you forget that I had pronounced your Avartana superior to Delhi's Indian Accent long before the world woke up to it. Avartana is still consistently impressive, but it's not the only excellent restaurant you house. You are awash with recommendation-worthy foods in Pumpkin Tales and Dahlia, Kappa Chakka Kandhari and Southern Spice, Zhouyu and Erode Amman Mess, The Farm and MadCo. There's of course, Mathsya, my preferred place for late-night rasa vada and Murugan Idli, an endorsement of which, elite Chennai tells me, obliterates the last shred of credibility I possess as a gourmet. I like you because you are a cerebral city. You are secure enough about it not to wear your brains on your veshti. You like poetry but will not recite it at a party. You like books. You restore libraries with quiet pride and are reticent to talk about it. You have birthed places like Tulika Books, stepping into which jaded adults become excitable children. It was on my first visit there that my new children's book was incubated. I like that you underplay yourself like someone who's absolutely sure of themselves. I like you because your best-kept secret — your remarkable metro — is actually a secret. Sure, other Indian cities have metros, but yours is cleaner and has more disciplined passengers. It's completely devoid of hype — perhaps that's why it took me months to discover that it even existed. Once I availed myself of a ride, I was hooked. It confounds me that something this groovy can be this absent from mainstream national consciousness. I understand the metro's reach isn't as wide as Delhi's; that's no excuse for you not to give it pride of place on your list of triumphs. But that's you, Chennai — you don't shout out your achievements the way other cities do. I like you because you have convinced me that I am perhaps not carved from stone after all. I momentarily become a softer, kinder, more thoughtful version of myself in the midst of the chaos of the Kapaleeshwarar temple. My family thinks at this rate I'll become a reincarnation of Shiva himself. I have you to thank for that, dear Chennai. I like what you become in the winter. It's as though you decide to shoulder the cultural burdens of the entire planet with your enthusiasm for concerts and canteens. Until I encountered a January here, I assumed Januarys were miserable almost everywhere. You make the ugliest month palatable, Chennai. And perhaps you yourself become more palatable because of your proximity to Kovalam, Mahabalipuram and Pondicherry. It helps that I don't have to negotiate the obstacle course that is your airport to get to these places. Happy Birthday, Chennai. You easily are among the least pretentious places in the world. Ostentatiousness isn't in your DNA. I shall not romanticise your people and claim that you have the nicest, kindest, most helpful population in the world. I have met better people elsewhere, and I have confronted worse people elsewhere. But I am yet to come across a populace whose vast majority is as shorn of affectation as yours is. Happy 386th Birthday, Madras. You continue to delight me, humour me and exasperate me. I look forward to seeing how you grow this year. I hope to be around for your 387th. I love you, Prajwal Prajwal Parajuly is a novelist. Karma and Lola, his new book, is forthcoming in 2026. He teaches creative writing at Krea University and oscillates between New York City and Sri City.
The Hindu
13-08-2025
- The Hindu
Author Prajwal Parajuly chases the perfect dumpling and finds it in Chennai
Almost all my favourite restaurants in New York and London, or anywhere else, are east Asian or Southeast Asian. Clearly, I have a bias for foods from a certain part of the world. In New York, I often go to Thai Diner and Jeju and Atoboy. For no-frills Chinese, I like Chili. I've sadly not met a single New York dim sum I can unreservedly recommend—not in Chinatown, not in Flushing, and not even at the aforementioned Chili. For the perfect dim-sum, I choose Royal China Club in London. How serious a patron am I? On a recent weeklong trip to the city, I went to the restaurant four times. I twice took the train from Paris a few years ago just to eat the crispy lobster dim-sum for lunch. For Japanese, I like Akira—I was once fed an avocado there, skin intact, and was open-mouthed at the chef's ability to render spectacular the inedible. For somewhat pretentious Chinese fare, I like A Wong. The New York Din Tai Fung is better than the London one, but neither can quite capture the magic of the Asian DTFs. Closer home, in Calcutta, I go to Beijing and Chinoiserie and Ban Thai. In Delhi, I patronise a Chinese restaurant I shall not name. It's so good and so seedy. Because Chennai is the most Korean city in South Asia, I've been able to continue indulging my love for the cuisine here. But I've long asked people where to go for the best Chinese and Thai and Indonesian food here. Some recommendations were better than others. Three in particular stood out. When I was first told of Pumpkin Tales, I bristled. Any restaurant that dabbles in that much range, I'd say, deserves to rot in the same culinary backwater where five-star-hotel buffets belong. Pumpkin Tales, though, is cuisine-agnostic in the best possible way. The offerings are as varied as laksa and Balinese curry; Tuscan chicken and garlic sherry mushroom; and sandwiches and Mee Goreng. I could say the restaurant is multi-cuisine, but the term is a pejorative in my book — every place that calls itself that serves unremarkable food. Pumpkin Tales definitely doesn't do unremarkable food. Run by Chef Chindi Varadarajulu, it specialises in these wholesome, homey dishes that are often earnest and always charming. I marvel at the chef's ability to craft a sourdough pizza with as much aplomb as the Thai green curry. I marvel that my family of self-righteous eaters smiled wide after sampling almost all the vegetarian stuff on the menu. Still, if the restaurant does Asian food so well, I once asked in between mouthfuls of bibimbap, why not just open an Asian restaurant? It turns out the team had the same idea. Zhouyu, a Chinese restaurant located two floors up in the same building, comes from the house of Pumpkin Tales. I was nervous about visiting the place, which specialises in Cantonese, Sichuan and Hunan cooking, because it came recommended by my editor, with whom I disagree on everything from chutneys to commas. To complicate matters, we decided to go together. As we worked our way through the yuxiang eggplant and prawns with ridge gourd, I noticed a shift: for once, she and I were on the same page. We agreed on the originality, know-how, and flavours. We both declared everything excellent. We'd be back soon. I returned part of a big, unwieldy group of ten with ridiculous dietary requirements. Some of us were vegetarian. Others were pescatarian. Some of us liked our tongues singed by mala sauce. Others had the spice tolerance of two-year-olds who hadn't experienced the world beyond applesauce. In its recommendations, the restaurant managed to accommodate us all. We ordered the Hong Kong fish, a delicately spiced sea-bass, with zero expectations and evolved into unequivocal fans. I'd rate the dim-sum here better than any I've had in New York in terms of wrapping texture, stuffing succulence and freshness of ingredients. I caught an avowed pescatarian in our group scarf down a chicken-and-chive dumpling. There's an easy competence to these restaurants. The service is heartfelt. One of the partners is always present — the standards are high. High is also where you go to use the bathroom, which is on an altogether different floor. Both the restaurants are the size of football fields, and I'd love it if they were divided into smaller, cosier rooms. Right now, at least Zhouyu feels a bit like Singapore — seemingly perfect and a tad antiseptic. But who notices the ambience when a bowl of soybean tauchu calamari is plopped in front of you? I come from a culture in which fermented soybean is a delicacy, but I have seen it polarise eaters whether I am in Japan or in the northeast. At Zhouyu, the fussiest of us declared the dish a hit. If soul — zany, kitschy, irreplaceable soul — is what you are after, you should head to Dahlia. Origami of various sizes and colours vie for your attention in a space that could have been conjured up in your trippy dreams. Like that weren't eccentric enough, the entire restaurant is serviced by one staffer, the famous Valli, smile unfaltering. You are incredulous that you are being carpet-bombed with butter fish, kaatsu and chawan mushi in this strange joint that is suspended in time and between continents. Is it 1960s Havana, 1970s Tokyo or 1980s Chennai that you are in, you wonder. That, of course, is part of the appeal. It helps that the food is unembellished and unpretentious. It is also delightful. If only one of these restaurants opened a Sri City outlet, how delicious life would be. Prajwal Parajuly is a novelist. Karma and Lola, his new book, is forthcoming in 2026. He teaches creative writing at Krea University and oscillates between New York City and Sri City.
India.com
12-08-2025
- India.com
Kodaikanal On A Shoestring Budget: Still As Dreamy As You Imagine
A serene hill station located in the Palani Hills of Tamil Nadu, Kodaikanal is famous for its mountains covered in mist, exuberant greenery and calm lakes. Often referred to as 'Princess of Hill Stations', Kodaikanal offers an escape from the hustle and bustle of everyday life with its natural beauty that won't break one's budget. Here is how you can live a good life while in Kodaikanal without spending much. 1. Low cost accommodation Accommodation options in Kodaikanal range from luxurious resorts to guesthouses and homestays for those on a budget. To save money, try booking into one of the many guesthouses or homestays away from main tourist spots. They usually offer decent accommodation which will guarantee you a feel of local lifestyle but are way cheaper when compared to hotels. 2. Look at Natural Beauty Kodaikanal has some truly beautiful scenery that you don't have to spend much cash seeing. Start your tour by visiting Kodaikanal Lake where you can enjoy a slow boat ride on its waters surrounded by beautiful views. Coaker's Walk is perfect for taking evening walks peacefully with a panoramic view of the valley. 3. Visit Local Attractions Most attractions in Kodaikanal either don't attract any fee or charge only a minimal entrance fee. Bryant Park known for its botanical garden hosting thousands of species of flowers and plants makes for a good picnic or relaxation spot. Bear Shola Falls may be less impressive during the dry season but it is worth visiting if one loves nature. 4. Trekking and Nature Walks Apart from being scenic, there are several trekking trails here that suit even those operating on tight budgets who love adventure activities such as trekking in this magical vacation destination.. Dolphin's Nose trek will give you a breathtaking view of the valley beneath while Vattakanal trek meanders through green forests and small villages, offering glimpses into the lives of locals. 5. Savor Local Cuisine Exploring local cuisine is an important aspect that can define one's experience when visiting any destination. Kodaikanal has several food outlets that offer delicious South Indian cuisines at pocket friendly rates. Some of the local specialities you should try are hot idlis with chutney, flavourful dosas and aromatic filter coffee. 6. Shop Wisely Shopping in Kodaikanal can be so much fun if you do it smartly. Instead of purchasing souvenirs from touristy stores, go to the farmers market or Tibetan Market where items are available at reasonable prices. There you can find handmade chocolates, homemade cheese and warm shawls at fair prices. 7. Embrace the Culture Get immersed in the local culture by attending cultural festivals or visit heritage places like Kurinji Andavar Temple'. This temple dedicated to Lord Murugan is known for flowering once every twelve years carpeting its hills purple with kurinji flowers. 8. Plan Off-Season Travel Traveling off-season not only helps avoid crowds but also saves significantly on both accommodation and activities because during this time, hotels lower their tariffs.' Monsoon season (June – September) turns Kodaikanal into a lush green paradise which is ideal for budget travelers to visit. 9. Enjoy Sunset Points There are many vantage points around Kodaikanal that provide stunning views of sunset free-of-charge including those at Pillar Rocks and Green Valley View (Suicide Point) as they offer panoramic vistas of surrounding landscapes where one can take unforgettable pictures during sunset periods without paying anything extra for them. Guide For cheap travel in Kodaikanal, it is relatively simple to get around without having to spend much. For travel between cities, you could use public buses or shared taxis rather than private ones. Many of the attractions are close enough together that you can walk from one to another and explore the town at your own pace without spending too much on transport. In conclusion Kodaikanal offers plenty of experiences for budget travelers looking for relaxation in the midst of nature's wonders. You will be able to enjoy a good life here because accommodation is affordable, there are natural sights to see, local cuisine to taste and most importantly embracing the culture. Hiking along green trails or simply admiring its lakes and hills serenely; Kodaikanal offers an experience that enriches without draining your wallet. Make smart decisions when planning your trip so that you can enjoy some beautiful moments in Kodaikanal while staying within your budgetary limits.
