Fresh amaranth leaves, popularly known as laal math, have hit the market in abundance. While not as loved as other leafy vegetables, three city chefs believe, based on experience and experimentation, that there is a lot of potential in this seasonal ingredient
Believing in its true potential, Chef Shailendra Kekade at the newly-opened Sante Spa Cuisine in Khar makes use of the vegetable in a dish called Amaranth Beet and Cherry Tomato Tart, as the star ingredient. Photo: Sante Spa Cuisine Khar
For Oshiwara-based home chef Nandini Deb, amaranth leaves or laal saag, as it is popularly known in Bengali, has a special place in her family and home. “Every day, somebody from my family is making saag in some way,” she says. Even on the day this writer spoke to Deb, her mother, whom the 30-year-old had talked to earlier in the day on the phone, told her she had made laal saag at their home in Kolkata. For the last two years in Mumbai, Deb has been running a delivery kitchen called Bangali Babu, together with her fiancé Nirban Goswami, that dishes out authentic Bengali cuisine. The traditional Bengali thali on her menu includes saag because “the experience is incomplete without it”.
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