Eating troubles

If you have eating troubles, I can assure you that have landed on the wrong page. All I have done is literally translated - Eating Locho - into plain speak english, ie Eating troubles.

Being brought up in Bombay, I am fairly familiar with the Bombay street lingo, which has a fair sprinkling and huge influence from the native Marathi and Gujarati colloquial. Locha traces its etymology to Gujarati and means trouble and hence Locho, the plural of Locha means troubles.

While locha was made popular by Raju Hirani when he had Munnabhai mouth an unusual combination of words - "Chemical locha". And in yet another another Raju Hirani caper, he has Kareena describe Gujarati food - Dhokla Faafda Handva Thepla Khakra - as missiles. But our Surti's take the cake. They have redefined the traditional missile' khaman into a hugely popular variant called Locho. 

I was in Surat last week and savoured this awesome variant of Surti food at the Gopal Locho Khaman House.

Served piping hot with crisp sev, pickled onions, diced chillies and mint and coriander sauce - this dish is a huge winner

Local legend is that while making a normal khaman , a messed up consistency led to its invention. This unguided missile , has surprisingly found innumerable takers and hence the dish is fondly called locho. 

Available in other cuisines too.....Italian locho and Chinese locho.

There are a few other dishes, that not only take the cake but the entire bakery.....Italian Vada Pav.

And figure this one out yourself. Is the chef inspired by Tamil siren Nylon Nalini?

Happy New Year!