Long before the term ‘celebrity chef’ became fashionable, Hemant Oberoi already embodied it. But food wasn’t his first love — he simply loved eating, especially the chicken and mutton dishes his nani, a vegetarian herself, cooked to perfection back in Firozpur, Punjab. He remembers devouring ‘tawa wala meat’ for four annas at a dhaba in Ludhiana, ‘cycle-pipe wale chole’ with thin kulchas for one anna outside his school and homestyle ‘tariwala’ meat and rajma during his hostel days in Kapurthala. Yet, when it came to a career, his heart was set on medicine.

“My father was a railway station master. During the first war of 1965, we would take food to him at the station and often saw trains full of injured soldiers. The helplessness of not being able to help stayed with me. We also served the

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